The Dwarf, the Drow and the Demon
by Stark Indifference
Summary: Based on a series of freely-distributed Dungeons & Dragons adventures, the episodic saga of Grummin, Phauran, Kasia and Kharyssa as they journey through the least hospitible corners of Toril in a blind-fight effort to undercut Drow aggression underground.
1. Prologue

Prologue

The creature moved like a shadow, not lingering on any surface or pausing to drink from the small spring on the floor of the pitch black side-cavern. Its walls were rough and wild, not crafted by gnomish or Drow tools or mined for its rich adamantine striations. No, this was a place of monsters and vermin, unchecked growths of mushrooms and algae dotting its moist surfaces and dark corners. This was far outside the outskirts of Menzoberranzan and civilization. This didn't matter to Crosaad Do'recranopol, however, who rode his Underdark lizard mount on past the rats and spiders of the deep places so silently and swiftly. Stealth was paramount to the success of the mission with which he had been charged, and silence was as commonplace as breathing to any dark elf as endangered and competitive as Crosaad of house D'a'racraspernion.

He rode on, clutching a beating amulet to his robed chest. The frequency was increasing; not far now.

Crosaad's red eyes scanned the dark cave for the umpteenth time in the ten seconds it had taken to get halfway across on his quick mount, infravision illuminating the whole place in infrared light. The key was not to hug the darkness, any knowledgeable Drow knew, but to hug the heat. Here and there, the hue of a small shifting fault or a swarm of infrared moss showed to the eyes of the intrepid dark elf, and the lizard skipped from one to the next like a water-strider on a churning lake, hiding their heat signatures from any unwanted eyes.

He saw the heat of a swarm of black arachnids brighten the corridor beyond and he urged his ride to the right. The steed extended the enumerable barbed hairs on its padded feet and mounted the wall of the cave, its tail whipping up into a copse of fungus and hiding them from the oncoming spawn.

They surged past with much thumbing of huge, hairy feet and clicking pincers, and though they seemed savage, Crosaad saw the distinct red glint of infravision in their eyes as he reverted to the visible spectrum for the shortest of instants.

When they moved on, so did he, keeping to the wall this time and entering the next corridor with care. These had not been scouts, but perimeter guards, though not on blood-rampages. These were not aware of his presence, but merely under the psionic control of the Drow elves within the compound which was his destination. As he entered the next corridor, the frequency of the amulet now indicating that he was only some hundreds of metres away from the compound, he did not reflect, but merely recalled a prior reflection so as to devote as much attention as possible to the space before him. This contemplation had been based on the strangeness of finding a compound of Menzoberranzan this deep in the wilds. He supposed that it was sensible to base a psionic house in such a place to control the surrounding monsters, such as the passing spiders, or other such things, to their advantage, but the usual pomp and pride of the black-skinned elves generally demanded a place in the cavern of the notorious city. It seemed, however, that these were pragmatists, and did not require the onyx towers and web fences common to the more ostentatious houses.

The beats of the amulet were now so close together that they nearly merged into one soundless hum against his muscled torso. At this signal Crosaad brought his steed to a stop on the stone ceiling and, enacting an innate spell of levitation, dismounted.

He grabbed a small stalactite handhold with one delicate hand and held the amulet out with the other, rotating himself and sensing the fine changes in frequency through his digits. East.

He pushed off and glided along the ceiling before coming to a stop before the door.

He drew a small crest from the folds his silk robes. On it was inscribed a simple head with pointed ears and a pickaxe impeded in the region of its brain's frontal lobe, which was the crest of Cendobrananon. It had taken time to master the use of this crest, as that of his own house had been with him since the time of his birth and was like an organ to him. To transplant it had taken some getting used to, but it was essential that he learn to levitate with it and establish a link that would allow him entry to the house. And, sure enough, when he pressed it to the stone before him, a shining outline of infrared light dazzled his eyes before a slab of stone the size of a large tombstone slid out of sight to admit him. Though he was tall for a male drow, he had no trouble slipping through the opening before it hissed closed. He cringed at the sound.

Beacons of light at regular intervals along the walls made it difficult to see as he strode forward into the house, so he converted his vision to the visible spectrum again to find that dim candles had been lit in the entrance corridor of the eccentric house's compound.

He activated psionic wards in his mind. Though he was only trained in arcane magic, he had also prepared these spells for this specific occasion. However, if he were faced with a full-on encounter with a psionic mage in their very own house, he would have to enact much stronger wards to keep his heat.

He advanced through the halls and winced every now and again as he passed by the candles. They were not a customary addition to any edifice in the lightless Underdark. Compounds were not places of light, and thus the eyes of dark-dwelling creatures were dangerously susceptible to such things as candles, even muted ones like these. Here and there he also saw a servant kobold with a glazed expression on his face, maintaining the candles, but not noticing the intruder either because of his wards or the fact that they were totally brainwashed by their masters. He also noticed meditation chambers branching off the hallways that he traveled, always keeping the amulet in his hands. They seemed to contain Drow who were either sleeping or in trances.

Finally, lucid beings began to appear. The first entered from a hallway to Crosaad's right, and he had to draw his piwifwai, a long cloak of concealment, around him and shrink into the shadow of a corner, but after that he was on his guard. He dodged and ducked, and even levitated into an upper tunnel to avoid five patrols simultaneously meeting in an intersection. Swinging down from this tunnel ten metres farther, he realized that he was face-to-face with two Cendobrananon Drow. They looked to be nobles, clothed in dark robes, each with the crest of their house on their chests, and they were standing before a door which bore that same crest.

Their eyes showed no alarm, merely satisfaction, as they raised their hands, palms out, and sent out a psionic blast each.

Crosaad staggered under the power of the blows, and had barely begun to cast wards before a third came from behind.

_Fool_, he thought to himself. _The patterns of those patrols were not coincidence. This is an ambush. _

He was on his knees. He had abandoned magic altogether and was clamping his hands over his temples as a second wave of mental energy stunned him and sent his concentration spiralling within his skull.

He was face-down before he perceived that it had all stopped. He craned his neck and tried to focus on the guard now in front of him through his migraine. He recognized the sneering face now; it was Larolos, a fellow student at Sorcere. He had befriended Crosaad once, or at least, as he had found out later, had formed a temporary alliance, and aided him against the others in their year in the Final Magic, the summative competition at the end of his magical schooling, but his betrayal had come when he had left him to a cave-fisher in the wilds. Now his satisfaction in overpowering him so completely was abundantly evident.

He grabbed a fistful of his white hair and, evidently after psychically ordering the door to open, walked into a great cavern.

The first and only thing Crosaad saw was the reflective floor, which showed his chiselled face to be bruised from the exposure to psionic power, and his red eye had been blacked, a trickle of dark blood running from its corner.

Larolos released his hair roughly, causing him kiss the onyx without ceremony, and stepped back. He thought he knew why as his amulet stopped beating.

He got to his knees, then attempted experimentally to put his feet under him. Finding equilibrium easily enough, he stood and surveyed the cavern with a broader eye.

It was not all onyx tile, as the bitter-tasting floor had been, but it was polished to the same reflective sheen nevertheless. A million-million muted candles spat and wavered on the rock and stung his eyes before he looked directly in front of him. A beautiful Drow female looked on him with eyes full of distaste and experience. He sensed psionic, magical, and physical wards around the throne upon which she rested, and her robes were artfully scant, with a depiction of a splayed, black spider on its front. A matron mother, eleventh in the city.

She cocked her head to one side and spoke. The form of communication seemed alien after the long duration of silence preceding this moment.

"Our houses have shown few hostilities in the past, and yet you have stormed my citadel with your mind set on me. Do you now seek war?"

He showed no emotion as he replied, "I follow the orders of my matron. Seek council with her if you wish to know the intent of my house, Slania."

"In that case," she responded, "You are quite as dispensable as my kobolds, son of D'A'racraspernion."

She lifted her hand from the arm of her throne, which became pliable immediately, and drew a long psionic wand from the muddy, black depths, which she pointed directly at him. "Cendobrananon takes no prisoners."

Thought had finally returned to him in the face death, and he used it. This was a moment in which Crosaad was profoundly thankful that Lolth had granted him the gift of sorcery, for only they had the power to perform multiple magics at once. Though the strength of each task performed lessened steadily as the number grew, it did not matter in this case, for they were minor effects only. The first melted the surface of the amulet and joined it to the house crest, the second enacted a strong psionic barrier, and the third readied three magic missiles.

"Wait," he yelled, as this was being done. "I won't be needing this." He casually tossed the welded amulet masquerading as the crest at the matron mother who lowered the physical ward for an instant in order to catch it.

Her eyes narrowed with mirth at the sight of the amulet. "So that is why my fourth son was killed-"

She broke off, perceiving the harmless pulse of magical energy emanating from the amulet half of the item. Her eyes widened with horror just as what appeared to be a superheated arrowhead melted through the miles of hard rock between house Do'recranopol and Slania and impacted on the wards around her, causing them to disband immediately. Psionic attacks assaulted him from all sides in a cacophony of violent thoughts and ricocheted off his barrier, but he took no heed. Crosaad loosed all three missiles at once, two of them killing two of the guards who had pulled him into the room, and the most concentrated flying to impact spectacularly on Slania, now standing and pointing her wand at him once more. She and the magical projectile exploded satisfyingly in a shower of dazzling blue sparks, but not before the wand had gone off, and a missile ten times as powerful as his had shot towards him.

Having used his quota of magic for the day, Crosaad grimaced and dove aside as the missile burned past and impacted on the door to the audience chamber, sending a tremor through the rock and melting the door shut on what must have been the whole house come to investigate the sudden commotion. He was not worried, however. He dashed to the throne and shoved his hand into its arm, then, after a few moments of poking around the various items within its extensive inventory, extracted his hand clutching a small square of cloth. He then jogged to the side of the large room and levitated to the place where the arrow had entered, which had cooled to a small tunnel just barely broader than his shoulders. He gripped the edges of the tunnel and slid his body in, then propelled himself swiftly out of the compound, and, after miles of tiring travel, into the cavern of Menzoberranzan with his treasure.

He sank to the ground and began to walk freely through the streets and past the various compounds of the city's hierarchy; including survivors of the disastrous invasion of Mithral Hall: Baenre, Autro'pol, SentraCaln, and Plolnira, to name a few. Arach-Tinilith loomed in the distance, a gigantic, jagged heat-shadow in his re-activated infravision. As he got closer, he saw two titanic spider obelisks at the towering entrance to the school of Lolth. They were outlined with glowing red faerie-fire, and they bore an unnerving, animated resemblance to the actual thing; just more evidence of the Drow's constant allusions to the Spider Queen.

Lolth, the Spider Queen, was the deity around which the entire Drow civilization revolved, the centrepiece of chaos and malice in the evil depths of the Underdark. She encouraged pragmatism and selfishness and the lust for power which drove the uncounted thousands of feuds that had ravaged Menzoberranzan from its first day of existence. The Drow flourished in the conflict and intrigue and loved war. It gave their lives purpose.

And such was the feeling in Crosaad Do'recranopol's heart as he strode confidently towards the two symbols of evil which parted before the Drow respectfully.

Before they closed, two beings joined him in his stroll; Kishtoni Baenre and the small viper, Sisuu. Crosaad bent down to receive the snake and it curled around his ebon-skinned hand with apparent relish. _She performed flawlessly_, the snake imparted through their empathic link as she slithered up his wrist.

Kishtoni's fingers bent and twisted in his direction, forming words in the intricate Drow sign language. _You have it, then?_

Crosaad drew the cloth and threw it to her. She caught it and, flicking her shock of startling, controversially black hair out of her slender, almost gaunt, face, looked it over. She seemed satisfied.

_I applaud your aim,_ he signed, smirking as he noticed the bow slung across her back beside a quiver of arrows.

She smirked too. It was an unusual thing to see her show happiness of any kind. The unfortunate story that was reflected in her stooped stance began when she was fourteen.

A noble, then just barely capable of the high Drow language, she should have shown signs of Lolth-granted magic, but no such gift made itself evident in those early years. She also lacked physical dominance over the males in the house, and was bullied accordingly. Within months, it was evident that she had not been favoured by Lolth, as all other Lolthite females were. Her nobility was the only thing that separated her from the ranks of houseless street-urchins, who died quickly, so her house made the only decision they could: she was to be trained in melee combat.

Kishtoni's days in Melee Magthere had been rough, but she was stronger for them, and had come out second in her class with her deadly longbow behind Drizzt Do'Urden, who had turned rogue and joined the surface-dwellers, and good riddance. But their paths were yet to cross again.

In the invasion of Mithral Hall, Drizzt had battled her line of fighters, had even wounded her in the fighting, but he had left the fray quickly and killed Matron Baenre, halting the invasion and decapitating her house. She was now a cursed female with no house and no nobility to keep her alive. Crosaad had taken her in purely for her unparalleled talent as an archer, and she had performed spectacularly since.

Their way to the chamber, one of many in the vast academy of magic, was unencumbered, and all three felt a heady sense of climax as Crosaad pushed the door open.

A tall, muscled priestess, Pirchtasa by name, stood waiting for them by an emerald scrying glass, and beckoned them forward when Crosaad had closed the door behind him. He proffered the square of cloth and she immediately snatched it, saying harshly out loud, "Is it done?"

He tried not to roll his eyes at the redundant question as he replied, "Yes," in a very clipped tone.

"Subtly?" was the interrogative, though not unjust, response.

The edges of his mouth quirked up as he caught Kishtoni's eye, while the priestess examined the cloth. "Somewhat."

Haughty Pirchtasa raised her eyebrows , but did not inquire further, instead flattening out the material on a small table. She placed the tip of her forefinger on its centre and murmured, _Naecrislu revlacra_. Reveal your contents. The divine magic drew out infrared ink, illuminating a maze of intricate lines and icons. A map.

"Well, male," she intoned condescendingly, looking up at him with unreadable eyes, "I give you the Tor of Hightower."


	2. A Dark and Stormy Knight

A Dark and Stormy Knight

Night crept over the planes of the north and engulfed the four wandering travelers, silhouetted against the grassy hillside by intermittent flashes from the dark sky. Lightning arced down from the rolling clouds and split the sky into jagged pieces before impacting on the ground to frightening effect while sheets of heavy rain sprayed the hillsides and the tops of the group's heads. The ominous peaks of the Spine of the World mountain range to the north and the treetops of the Neverwinter Wood to the south were like rows of teeth, the foothills a dark throat, ready to swallow them in its stormy wrath.

Any hope of making Fell Pass now forgotten, the elf, the dwarf, the human, and the half-elf now scampered over the broken ledges of lightning-split granite in search of suitable refuge in the rolling foothills of the monumental Fourthpeak.

The elf, Phauran, paused as he spotted an anomaly: the dark outline of a large structure which had flashed against the blue-lit sky.

The lightning storm pounded in his ears as he screamed to the others over the hiss of driving precipitation and boom of thunder, but only the familiar bat, Ixpie, clinging to the rags that hung off his thin body, heard his words. Noticing the humanoids cupping their hands to their ears in a vain attempt to hear him, he abandoned the effort and merely pointed to the formation. It seemed that they understood, however, for they started their advance through the waving grass and screaming wind.

A lone, wild stallion galloped across their path as they leaned against the wind, clearly bolting in fear, but with no place to go. Before Phauran could even think of psionically calming the beast, however, a shaft of white light descended and smote the steed with instant lethality. Tendrils of electricity spiralled along its body and between its teeth as it whinnied for the last time.

This was getting dangerous, and they were at least a hundred feet from the structure.

The group veered right towards a low limestone escarpment and ducked out of the wind. Finally able to move unencumbered, they jogged along the shelter of rock until it melded into the hill and they were feet away from what looked like a massive, ancient tor. At the base of the tower-like structure growing seamlessly out of the grassy hill, a huge gable hung over an ornamented door which looked to be at least twenty feet high and ten feet wide by their estimation. The overhanging shelter looked like it was built for just such a storm as this, so they ran forward and hunkered under its protective stone roof.

After they had left the sudden light and the dark behind them, Phauran's fair elven features were sharply pronounced. Though he was a long way from his elven heritage in the dancing Moonwood, the high, regal cheekbones and naturally arched eyebrows were even more prominent due to the near-emaciation brought on by nearly ten decades of hard living, to which his ragged robes were another testament. Across from him were his three traveling companions.

Most noticeable among the tall folk of the north was Grummin. Short, stout, and quintessential in his dwarven build, he wore no helm over his broad head of matted black hair, and his body was encased in a slightly neglected-looking set of half-plate armour, but the heavy battleaxe that now lay across his lap was as many-notched and tough as his scarred features. He knew nothing of his past, often commenting that it was all a blur to him, like a half-forgotten nightmare. The only detail that he could remember was the white, staring face of an ancient dwarf, cut down ruthlessly by something he'd had no time to see.

Leaning against the wall beside him was Kharyssa, the half-elf in studded leather with only two daggers sheathed at her belt. Street life had given her the rogue's build that she wore much better than Phauran. The history of her dark skin was something of a mystery to the rest of them, as they had been companions in Faerûn since adolescence, but they had never bothered to inquire. These three had banded together at a young age with no surnames or money to speak of to make their ways in the back-alleys of Luskan. It was there they had met the fourth member of their party, Kasia.

Grummin trotted easily beside his elf companion, beard swinging merrily in the crisp autumn wind, battleaxe resting in a loop in his leather belt. His easy station was compensated for by Phauran's attentive gaze. His sharp eyes were suspicious slits taking in every detail of their ramshackle surroundings, and ramshackle they were. The dilapidated warrens of Luskan were not the sketchiest that could be found, but close to: doors of buildings built up from what was once a marine scrap yard for the dozens of expired trade ships which passed through the port annually lined the muddy alley they now trod, and the lack of any sewage system in the slums left them in no doubt of what the ground was made of. Beggars too weak to build or fight for shelter simply rattled tins, too woebegone to bother asking anymore, and prostitutes posed on corners. The whole thing was a messy addition to the otherwise wealthy village, and the home of Phauran and Grummin.

Closer to the actual town, the depth of sickly waste decreased, and they came to a squat little tavern with a wooden plank over the door reading _the Tipsy Tart_, a rare and luxurious extravagance to the slum's population—at least those wealthy enough to think twice about dining ankle-deep in muck.

They entered the first level of the building, a bar with a simple collection of wooden tables and chipped flagons for serving. The well-off-looking landlord standing behind the bar wiping a gleaming carafe with a rag leaned forward to keep Grummin in sight, as only his black hair was visible over the spotless counter.

"What'll it be?" he inquired politely, wincing as they flicked their soiled shoes clean on his hardwood floor.

"Dwarven holywater fer me, and wha'ever pansy Luskan brew ye pour 'round here for me elven friend," ordered Grummin in his gruff, dwarven accent.

The landlord nodded thoughtfully and turned from them to fix their drinks.

The two seated themselves near the middle of the tavern. When the landlord set their table, they raised their respective mugs of drink in a toast, for the next day they were going to leave Luskan for good, and they were going to spend their last night in style—style being relative.

Half an hour later, Grummin wiped his beard clean of the amber foam from his fourth serving of holywater and sat back with a pronounced belch. After living and surviving for decades with Grummin, Phauan knew when the dwarf had had enough, and stood now, setting down his half-full mug of mead and clapping the dwarf on his muscled shoulder.

"Come on," he urged, and the dwarf rose obediently, though ogling one of the better-groomed prostitutes rather stupidly on the way to the bar.

Phauran approached the landlord again, this time offering up seven silver pieces, five too many for their drinks.

"What's this?" the Landlord asked, not unkindly, putting down what must have been the twentieth polished mug on his immaculate bar.

"My friend and I would like to spend the night in a room." Phauran pushed the money forward with one hand, separating the five surplus silvers from the rest. "Two beds, if you please."

The man nodded again and handed over a key from under the counter.

"Cheers," said Phauran as he turned around with Grummin, who gave the prostitute a final, lewd wink as they disappeared up a narrow staircase to the next level and left her behind. However, when they got to their door, that same girl was there, walking casually into their room while unclasping the front of her—for lack of a better word for the frilly, barely-covering combination of corset and translucent mesh skirt—dress.

Grummin stopped halfway into the shabby room containing only two beds and a small table in between. "Uh…" he grunted, eyeing her in confusion.

She turned to him, eyebrows raised but otherwise unperturbed by his reaction.

"Well if ye insist," he said after a few awkward moments, and started forward into the room again. But he was brought up short by Phauran's outstretched arm.

"Unless you intend to tag-team," he scoffed coldly, "I am afraid this will be quite impossible to coordinate." His gaze fell upon the whore who was now in the middle of the room. Though her corset was still casually open, she was hanging her beautiful head in shame, and it struck Phauran how childish she looked. Blond hair and blue eyes set against a pale, soft face gave the impression that she was barely post-pubescent, perhaps seventeen.

He fumbled with his purse and extracted one gold coin which he threw with surprising force onto the floor of the hallway, then walked forward to address her.

He didn't have the heart to say anything more than a curt "Go" to send her scampering from the room, re-fastening her garments as she scooped up the gold piece.

Not noticing Grummin lie down and immediately start to snore, he sat down with his face in his hands, elbows resting on his thighs, breathing hard. Phauran was glad to be rid of her; he had felt like a wretched old degenerate looking down at the helpless teen in the revealing clothes she was no doubt forced to wear by that mannerly barman. They needed to leave.

When he awoke the next day, he immediately slapped Grummin out of his hangover and hastened to leave the tavern, feeling unclean. They stole back down the alleys and into the very heart of the warren to what had been, until that day, their house. Domed and sturdy, it was made of the curved planks from the hull of a ship, and supported heavily from the inside. A rough door had been cut from the planks and reattached with hinges and a relocking latch.

Grummin approached the door cautiously, now fully recovered from his torpor of the previous day, and pressed his hand to a spot just above the latch. This was what made their house a safe-house. Through Phauran and Kharyssa's joint efforts, they had managed to install a trap in the door. The magical sensor deactivated the dart trap set in the joint of the latch in the eventuality that someone picked the sophisticated lock and attempted covert entry.

And when Grummin unlocked the door, there Kharyssa stood, daggers sheathed at her sides, and a large pack of supplies hefted on her back. Two more equally full packs sat neatly on the floor beside her. Weapon racks, food reserves, and even the skeleton of their last pig lay empty, though not one pang of sentimentality drew Phauran's gaze back to the house as Grummin tightened his half-plate and they walked away, hefting their packs and leaving the door wide open.

As they passed into the civilized city, however, Grummin paused outbound, twenty feet from the bar in which they had indulged the previous night, uncertain. And Phuaran couldn't help but sympathize with the dwarf on this. She had seemed so pathetic, so very defeated…

"What is it?" demanded Kharyssa, halting and looking impatiently at the pair of them.

The dwarf still looked back at the tavern. "The girl," he muttered vaguely. "Do ye think that we should be takin' her with us?"

Kharyssa didn't know about the previous evening, but she got the gist right away.

"No rescues. Especially not some prostitute urchin." She gazed up at the building as well, with evident distaste. "She'll slow us down." Kharyssa had never been the sympathetic type. Her tendency towards realism clashed dramatically with the others' philosophies, especially with Grummin. This was one of those times when it showed.

He looked pleadingly at Kharyssa. "I swear she won't," he begged. "I'll take full responsibility for her!"

"You seemed to want to take full responsibility for her last night, too," scolded Phauran, cottoning on to his rogue counterpart's way of thinking.

The dwarf set his rugged face defiantly. "Ye know that I didn't mean teh, elf," he said, now raising an eyebrow and folding his arms across his burly chest. "She won't be any trouble, mark me words. I'll take care of her, and ye'll be happy to have her along."

Phauran sighed and nodded; Kharyssa rolled her eyes at the sky and stepped back helplessly.

Summarily, what happened in the moments following was as follows: Grummin asked for the girl at the bar, brought her to a room on the second level, and used a rope to climb down a windowless side of the stone edifice. At first it had seemed as if they would cause no commotion at all on their way out… when a scream rent the air. Kharyssa paid the fleeing pair one exasperated look before running alongside them, the girl looking suspiciously satisfied and out of breath, Grummin sprinting to keep up as they burst through the open Luskan gates and into the wilds.

It had turned out that Kasia had killed the landlord with a cheese knife when he had come up to scold some servant or other. It also turned out that she was a much better ranger than she had looked. She had run with quite as much speed and agility as Kharyssa. They had given her one of Phauran's better bows and a quiver of arrows fletched with gull feathers, and a set of Kharyssa's leather street clothes. They had begun their life on the run.

They had been intent upon Tentowns, a far-flung northern settlement set in the heart of wintry Icewind Dale, for nearly two months now, which was far outside the jurisdiction of Luskan's guard.

But now, Grummin reflected, the challenge was to reach the northern frontier on time. The valley between Fourthpeek and the eastern stretch of the Spine of the World comprised Fell Pass, their avenue to the northern towns and freedom. If all went as planned, they would seek asylum in Settlestone beyond before the seasons turned and then proceed to Tentowns in Icewind Dale. But all was not going to plan. This storm had been the latest in a series of minor setbacks which had conspired to land them at least a tenday behind schedule. He was now worried that they would not make the pass before it wintered and their path was closed.

"Well, we can scrap Tentowns," he declared in his gruff northern dialect over the howling wind. "May as well set up camp."

Kasia sat pensively for a few moments while the others busied themselves starting a fire before contributing.

"Why don't we just go inside?" She gestured to the door behind her with a jerk of her head.

Grummin stood up and scratched his head, considering the stone for a few seconds before saying, "Nah, that stone's pretty solid; yeh'd be wasting yer time tryin'. Pity, too," he sighed, addressing the structure. "That tower looks like it can take a beatin', no doubt."

"And it won't be flooded," said Phauran, not looking up from the worn spellbook open on his lap but indicating with his finger the steady flow of rainwater churning downhill from the door.

They all nodded accordingly, and gave up the hissing embers of what could have been a fire as a bad job.

The original plan had been to travel west before the Spine and head to Silverymoon to join the hospitable people of the silver city, but Kasia, in a surprising stroke of cleverness, had pointed out that the elven city was probably the most obvious refuge, so riders were bound to block their path before they got within fifteen miles of the place. As well, Lady Alustriel herself would probably have alerted her guards to the refugees. Silverymoon was closed to them. Grummin was the one to suggest that they go to Tentowns. It was remote, yet well supplied through its natural resources. As well, they would pass Mithral Hall, a place that Grummin had wanted to visit since he had heard of its rediscovery.

They spent several long minutes after that contemplating their misfortune, Phauran still reading, Grummin running his calloused thumb across the sharp side of his axe, Kasia tapping her foot, Kharyssa stabbing the mossy floor with one of her knives.

Then Kharyssa noticed something the others didn't, and looked up, wrenching one dagger out of the ground and totting it, ready to throw.

A face, black as charcoal with red eyes, mask-like in perfection, materialized before them in a single flash of lightning, followed by a body clothed in undecorated silk robes. Grummin, out of all of them, recognized the tall figure to be a Drow elf.

Before he could roar his hatred to the sky and rush forward to burry his axe in the elf's head, an arrow wizzed past the dark elf's white hair and buried itself in Phauran's magical shield, stopping feet from the shocked dwarf.

Three more arrows whipped out of the darkness and deflected off Phauran's magic, finally dispelling it, and a second enemy showed itself: a huge creature the size of a troll but far more menacing. It wore a natural shell of armour connected at the joints by tough cartilage and bearing hooks where its hands should have been. Its beak-like mouth was open in a scream that seemed to raise the pitch of the surrounding wind.

Behind that, a third and fourth foe hurtled out of the darkness, one hulking with a falchion the size of Phauran's thin body, the other slender as the first with a longsword and clinking chain male.

In those moments, Kasia had knocked an arrow to her strung bow, Kharyssa had thrown a knife at the Drow, Phauran had drawn his own intricately-decorated longsword, and Grummin was struggling, enraged, to free his axe from its loop. The monster in shell armour was about to strike him down with a menacing hook when…

"STORM PEACE!"

The scene froze absurdly. The Drow in robes whom Phauran assumed to have some command of magic was straining, clearly fighting to mentally control the horrible beast intent on taking Grummin's head as an ornament for its armour. The one with the longsword was caught with one foot in the air, perplexed, and the humanoid behind him grunted simply. Kasia closed her mouth sheepishly and shuffled backward, having shown her unexpected knowledge of the wilds yet again.

Storm Peace was an almost universally understood term in the chaotic realm of Toril, though in other languages it was sometimes translated into Danger Stop or Danger Apathy. It was to signal a temporary ceasefire when conditions were too dangerous for fighting, as the mage seemed to realize as a fork of lightning impacted on the peak of the Tor and rained dried rock down on the attackers.

The hook-thing seemed to relax—at least, it lowered its hooks and stopped straining—and the humanoid and the second Drow sheathed their weapons.

A third Drow came to join the party out of the hail, this one with short, midnight-black hair that framed her thin face elegantly and a naturally stooped stature. A longbow was slung easily over her shoulder beside a quiver of arrows.

The Drow mage approached and spoke in perfect Common.

"Storm Peace indeed, human." He gestured the black-haired female forward, muttering "Kishtoni," and she scampered over to the monster, laying a hand on its armoured flank, seeming to have some control over it as it sat awkwardly against the stone door.

The mage flicked something silver at Kharyssa and she caught her thrown dagger, sheathing it deftly.

They all replaced their weapons in their respective loops and sheaths and the two groups retreated to opposite sides of the Tor, muttering darkly.

Grummin sat down with a clattering of armour and weapons and glanced back at the Drow, and what was revealed to be a Bugbear, muscle and tendons rippling under a thick coat of matted fur and a broad breastplate.

"Them damned Drow'll never have truce with _this_ dwarf," he growled dangerously, hunching his shoulders as the newcomers began to converse in the guttural dark elven tongue.

"Peace, Grummin," Kasia muttered. "We'll be away soon and rid of them." But she too peered past the dwarf at the dark-skinned creatures. "They attacked without provocation," she stated, perplexed, "Why?"

Kharyssa scoffed. "Why not? They're Drow. They hate surface-elves, dwarves, each other," she began to count on her fingers, "humans, gnomes… pretty much everything that moves. They would have killed us for fun."

Kasia crossed her arms and legs defiantly. "They wouldn't have found it so easy."

Phauran reopened his spellbook and read once again. "Don't be so sure," he advised in as much of an undertone as was necessary in the high wind and electrical crackling. "Drow are extremely skilled warriors, and I would not want to invite the displeasure of that Hook Horror, either." He tapped the open page of his book knowingly and went back to reading. There was drawn a diagram of the shell-covered creature with its menacing hooks and pointed beak and its various properties, though there were few. The only quality that was not abundantly clear from first glance was its strength, which one could guess from its size.

"They'll betray us, mark ye me," Grummin cautioned knowingly. He furrowed his brow and looked so absurdly like a bearded, prematurely-lined child that the others almost laughed, but then a flash of lightning very close by stole their mirth.

Phauran looked up warily into the roiling sky. The storm was not getting better, but worse.

Another flash of lightning and the sound of cracking stone rent the darkness. The weapons and armour of the two parties had drawn the electricity to the entrance of the Tor like a lightning rod, and it had struck dead centre on the huge, stone door.

The stone fell to pieces before their eyes, and the group from the Underdark jumped to their feet, sprinting through the rubble and into the darkness of the hillside complex. An arrow shot out in their wake from the bow of the female, Kishtoni.

"I told ye!" Grummin shouted, and got up and charged into the howling darkness as well. They heard one last "I told ye!" before a clang and a thump signalled that the dwarf had been stopped in his tracks.

The others advanced tentatively into the void, weapons out, eyes searching.

Their steps echoed ominously off of walls that must have been at least fifty feet apart, and the white flashes from outside cast bright images of the huge doorway.

Phauran muttered in elvish, flexed his fingers, and summoned a small globe of fire which hovered an inch above his pale palm, crackling slightly.

Though it did not throw every detail of the chamber into stark relief, it did reveal the obvious fact that this building had not aged well: Broken scrollwork from solid stone pedestals, which seemed to hold some brand of fire-oil, and peeling paint from the low walls littered the floor at the perimeter of the room, and a broken tile in the very middle showed where Grummin's skull had split the old vinyl. As for Grummin himself, he sat grumbling on the stone, shaking his head and banishing the red gleam of infravision from his black eyes.

"The Hook Horror," he said in explanation as Phauran gave him a deeply bemused look. "Hit me with one of its damned hooks. Only rung me bell, though. Underestimated me dwarven skull!" He knocked a knobbly fist on what could only be nothing short of an inch of hard bone. "I was stronger than this floor, anyway." He indicated the shattered tile, waved Kharyssa's proffered hand, and sprang energetically to his feet.

"Well," Kharyssa said in a weary sort of way, and nodded to the opposite wall from the one that they had entered, "they're gone now."

The group looked around to see a distinctly Hook Horror-sized hole in the thick stone door that hung off its ancient tracks, rubble littering the floor around it. The flashes from outside revealed no residual blood on the stone. The monster had not been scathed by the solid rock of the portal.

"What are we waitin' for, then?" Grummin blustered, and began to charge headlong into the dark once more, but Kasia was too quick for him. She grabbed the collar of his armour and lurched forward with the momentum of the run before the powerful dwarf got the picture and halted.

Phauran gave him a withering look, and Grummin shuffled his feet, swinging his battleaxe uselessly at his side. "We needn't pursue them," he explained calmly, and Grummin looked even more disappointed. "Their intentions were not to kill us, or they would have done it when the door broke and we entered a more hospitable battleground. And they would have had an advantage with their infravision." He paced back to the middle of the room. "No, we should set fire to those pedestals and wait out the storm."

They each pulled a rolled-up woollen mattress from their traveling packs and several blankets which they laid out and wrapped around themselves, ready to catch some much-needed rest.

Phauran took first watch. He knelt cross-legged on the floor, his one and only book of study open on his legs, reading the neatly-scrawled characters on the yellowing rice paper by the light of the fiery pedestals. This was quite an extensive volume by this time. Years of interrupted and disjointed note-taking on magical phenomena meant that most of its aged pages were still not filled, but those that were complete to the last detail were painstakingly so: anatomical diagrams, like that of the Hook Horror; studies of civilizations and cultures such as the Drow, the moon elves, the dwarves, or the gnomes; incantations for spells, including spells of inter-planar travel, short-range teleportation, or even some psionic skills, most of which were as yet far beyond his practiced experience.

Unlike a magical discipline focussed on divine or arcane magic, which would make the learner proficient in the use and application of these spells, wizardry was much more academically involved. Phauran was one such academic, and thoroughly cherished moments like these in which he could simply tackle the innumerable varieties of incomplete notes, or even start a new one, undisturbed.

But as he began to reread an old note based on the fundamentals of invisibility, he heard approaching footsteps. Light, quick, and timid; Kasia.

She sat down beside him, mimicking his cross-legged posture and reading his notes over his shoulder.

"Is there anything that you need, Kasia?" Phauran asked, knowing what the answer would be.

"No," she said, then lapsed into silence. "Grummin seems pessimistic about our prospects for the northern towns," she said after several minutes' silence. "I think we have a fair chance of making it."

"We will see what fate brings," Phauran replied distractedly, flipping a page, not glancing up.

Another minute's silence.

"Why-"

"It was Grummin's decision to free you." The severity of the statement alarmed both Kasia and Phauran, and he immediately began to stammer an apology.

_Ah, but you __were persuaded by Grummin_, imparted Ixpie, clawing her way up Phauran's sleeve and onto his shoulder. _And you saved the dwarf from temptation in the tavern. _

"Go back to sleep, Ixpie," Phauran mumbled.

_I think I'll stay right here_, said the troublesome bat, and clamped firmly onto the fabric of Phauran's care-worn robe. _This human troubles me. Mischief billows in her wake and carries on her voice; she has unsettled debts, food for corruption. She has strong morals, but a fragile mind. _

Phauran put his book down. She had long been a creature of suspicion. Phauran had wondered aloud on many occasions whether or not the bat would have been happier with Kharyssa, though, not being a mage, she was incapable of telepathy. But he was grateful for Ixpie's uses and her company, even if her conversational input was slightly discouraging. _I have never sensed that,_ he replied warily. _Don't tell me that she will stab me in the back after I saved her._

_She would more easily shoot you, and saving her was not so great a feat. No, she will do no such thing, but don't underestimate her capabilities. __She has past betrayals on her conscience._

"Sorry," Kasia mumbled, unaware of Ixpie's telepathic worries. "I only-"

She was cut short as an almighty crack of thunder rent the air, bright, terribly close. But this one did not stop. The rumbling grew louder and louder, seeming to come from overhead.

And when Grummin awoke with a wide yawn which turned into a yell as he looked at the ceiling, they all knew why.

Cracks the width of Phauran's arm were opening in great webs across the ceiling just inside the main entrance, showering them all in bits of stone and clay as they hurriedly gathered up their possessions and ran.

The fissures widened horrifyingly, then gave way to a deluge of rubble which blotted out the light from the outside. Their only avenue of escape was the broken door, and they took it.

As suddenly as it had started, the noise stopped, and they were in a different room.

This room was smaller, and seemed to have suffered more in age than the outer chamber had—that is, before the ceiling had collapsed. Its walls were pockmarked with small holes that looked deeper than the surface and stretched into darkness. A chest of plain black wood with thick iron ribs stood in the middle five yards from the broken door.

And before they'd had time to catch their breaths and set down their packs, a flood of rats, the size of barn cats, fleeing from the collapse.

Once a round fifty rats had exited the confines of their tunnels, squeaking and sniffing the air, feeling the walls and ground with their silvery whiskers, the beams of their black eyes zeroed in on the packs, smelling the remains of pork and pickings from the fall harvest, and even the wheel of ripe cheese Grummin had procured from the same farmer as the vegetables.

They swarmed.

Grummin killed five with a swipe of his ferocious axe, and Phauran matched that with his longsword. Kharyssa, who was crouched in her lowest ready stance, was swiping with her daggers, but the rats were too quick for her short weapons, and scurried away from her flailing blades. Kasia was even worse off; with only a bow and a quiver of arrows, which would be even less affective against such small opponents, she kicked squeamishly and accomplished nothing except losing several inches of ground against the tricky rodents.

As Grummin took another half dozen out, Kharyssa felt a sharp pain just above her wrist: a rat had clamped its pointed, yellow teeth around and was squeezing, puncturing the skin and drawing blood in small beads.

She easily laid open its flank with her dagger.

Another rat clamped onto Kasia's leg, but could not penetrate the leather leggings. Phauran pulled it telekinetically from her and crushed it to a gruesome pulp with a twitch of his hand.

They continued to hack at the monsters until they subsided, Kasia even landing a good kick once, and sending the huge rat flying and scurrying into a blocked hole.

The swarm subsided only after three quarters of their number had been killed or sent back. Sensing that there was no hope of obtaining food, they crawled, hissing grotesquely, back into their lairs with many a regretful glance at the packs, now being shouldered by their owners.

Kasia, panting with shock, sank to the floor and clung to her own knees. Grummin, however, seemed almost amused at the rats' attempt on food, and slid the handle of his heavy axe through his belt and rested one arm on the blade with a hearty smirk beneath the black beard.

He noticed the chest again. Kharyssa saw him walking, and her eyes widened as the dwarf pulled the ancient latch.

She was not quick enough to grab the back of his armour and yank him backward. Black darts shot with a pneumatic _fht_ from the vacant rat holes inward at the open trunk and the violator of its contents. They avoided most of the projectiles, which impacted on the wooden chest. But Grummin and Kasia both yelled out in shock and pain and collapsed.

Grummin doubled over, scrabbling at a wound in his gut, and Kasia shakily clutched her calf, breathing heavily through clenched teeth.

Kharyssa recognized the effects of poison. The tremors and wheezing breath they were experiencing were symptomatic of a well-known, non-lethal poison whose effects wore off only with time and rest. Rest was important, as the poison was potentially fatal in combination with adrenaline.

After she had finally persuaded Grummin and Kasia to sit still and allow her to extract the darts from their bodies, she proposed a break to set up camp again.

Phauran set up wards around the campers to keep the rats at bay, and let Kharyssa treat him and herself for infections from the creatures.

As all their minds slowed down and Kasia and Grummin gained control of their breathing and extremities, they began to think, and Kharyssa wasted no time in snatching two pearls and a sack of gold from the depths of the chest. They had to go on and find a way out of the Tor, and yet the more they progressed, the less welcome they seemed to be.

The Hook Horror, Lo'ol, as Kishtoni had dubbed it, threw its weight against the thick stone of a particularly resilient set of ornate doors. Its birdlike head and hooked arms lowered to expose its shoulder of white shell.

Crosaad observed the proceedings with boredom and frustration. They were so close. So close to finding their prize and escaping the surface to the cool, dark caverns, where he knew a ceiling protected him from the endless sky.

So far, after parting company with the surface travelers in the lightning storm, their party had snuck easily past several empty rooms, a lesser vargouille, and a gigantic spider, the latter made much easier by their Drow heritage.

He gazed around at the motley group with weary eyes, taking in the ragtag taskforce of his matron's selecting.

The most imposing figure was, of course, Lo'ol. Next came Roaki, their bugbear servant from the mines of house Do'recranopol. He stood several heads taller than Crosaad's slender mage's frame, and hefted a gleaming falchion. His red, heavyset eyes stared balefully at the immovable stone from beneath a dark-skinned brow. Then there was Solun, his well-worn longsword resting against a wall and a bored expression to match Crosaad's jaded visage. His black, pliable armour rippled over compact muscle and efficient swordsman's arms bearing common bracers and distinctly lacklustre gloves.

Solun and Roaki had been assigned to their force on the outset of their surface excursion to aid in combat, but not to know the mission, as Solun was a commoner, and the bugbear a slave. Therefore, Crosaad felt a just apprehension as Solun jumped nimbly to his feet, deftly sheathed the longsword in one languid motion of his poorly-clothed hand, and approached, the question he could not suppress on his lips.

"Will you never tell us of our objective?" he beseeched, eyes flitting between Crosaad's, searching for an answer.

"No," he said shortly, locking his gaze with Solun's insolent face. "Keep your seat, commoner."

He persisted. "I will find out in any case. You will not be able to deny me that when I have seen you extract whatever it is you are looking for."

It was true; Crosaad knew that Solun was as clever as he was impertinent, and the knowledge would belong to house Do'recranopol soon enough. But he was duty-bound by his matron.

"I cannot tell you. However, I will describe the immediate objective to you: a scroll of ancient parchment lies in the room beyond. It is inscribed with the ancient runes used by a civilization before the formation of Menzobarrenzan." Kishtoni was listening in now, not even pretending to test the tension of her longbow. "We will obtain the scroll, get past whatever other challenges the Tor chooses to array before us, and flee to the Underdark." He stared around at this point, particularly at Kishtoni. "Do not attempt to make off with the scrolls for personal gain, or I will summon your innards from your body."

Kishtoni glared. Exactly that had been on her mind. This might be the opportunity she had been waiting for to regain the respect of her house and return to a secure place at their side.

But alas, Triel was cruel and blunt, and cared nothing for scrolls. This would no more heighten her respect than heighten her stature.

And she felt a twinge of regret as a huge crack appeared in the carved door and spread with each of the Hook-horror's massive blows, which could not quite mask the screams of what sounded like two goblins from her acute drow ears.

The hobgoblins shrieked raucously, a sound that reverberated through the tunnels behind and ahead. And they fell just as extravagantly. A dagger thrown by Kharyssa's expert hand pierced the prominent forehead of the monster on their left, cracking skull and burying itself to the hilt before snapping its head backwards, seeming to break its thin neck. Meanwhile, in almost perfect unison, Kasia had knocked an arrow to her bow and let fly with a menacing twang that promised death. The single arrow went through the scaly goblin's sternum and protruded, gleaming, from his now-severed spine, sending out a trail of blood.

As gore and goblin hit the floor with a sickly thump, they sheathed their weapons coldly and retrieved their respective projectiles.

Once they had wrenched the dagger and arrow from the bodies, Kasia with some difficulty, and cleaned them of blood and brains, Phauran bade them forward with a bemused expression.

"Stole me kill," grumbled Grummin sliding the handle of his axe back into its loop.

Still surprised at the aptness of her kill, Kasia was the only one who did not immediately observe the room into which they and the marauding hobgoblins had strayed.

Tables of modest wood lay here and there throughout the dark room, their tops blotched with the rust of many iron implements. In the very middle of the space swung a rope which, on closer inspection by a curious and slightly crestfallen Grummin, extended up into a dark shaft which, by his estimation, must lead all the way to the top of the Tor. Rain fell heavily from this hole and collected in a large puddle. The puddle drained away into a patch of rusted grating, but a dark stain pointed out by Ixpie suggested that it had carried more than water in its day.

They moved forward, and found another of many smashed doors left by the intrepid hook horror and its stealthy companions.

They stepped over the rubble with weapons drawn. Immediately across from the group, at the far wall of the small chamber, rose what looked like an upright sarcophagus. The only abnormality apart from its position propped against the wall was its head, which was of a darker black than the aged paint of its headdress and body, and oddly distorted. A rippling effect on its pallid lips suggested the presence of fangs, and it was utterly earless. The tentacle-like hair flowed and shined organically above the blackish skull.

Just as they had finished marvelling at the strangeness of the statue and were moving on to the next smashed door, Phauran's harmless globe of fire fell upon its gleaming eyes, which had snapped open. The green flames beneath the surface of those eyes showed anger, and the skin of the mouth pulled back in a menacing snarl.

Before they knew to draw their weapons and attack it while it was still, wings sprouted from the sides of the head, grotesquely unfolding from holes in its cranium. It flapped furiously and darted about in a frenzy of agitated movement.

A flurry of arrows, daggers, and slashes from Phauran and Grummins' melee weapons followed its path, and for several frustrating seconds, projectiles and attacks missed, before Phauran sighed in exasperation.

He gathered magical power to his hands, wiggling his fingers and swiftly shaping a magic missile. He let fly with derisive accuracy and the magic impacted on the head, which he now recognized to be a small vargouille. It exploded.

"Come," he bade the others with a beckoning finger. "We must keep moving."

A hallway extended from the wreckage of the next door, which fell into darkness ten yards ahead. The gloom receded as Phauran carried his ball of warm orange fire down the corridor, but his and Grummins' sensitive eyes penetrated deeper than the rays of the crackling flame. They saw first the wooden door lying on the floor and the huddled shapes beyond. The layer of dust beneath their feet was as thick as soil, and padded their steps, enabling them to hear the distant, muffled cracks of thunder beyond the oppressive walls.

He didn't know how, but Phauran could sense that they were very close. He also did not know to what, but a climax of some kind seemed suggested by the long, dingy corridor and the broken-down door.

He was distracted from his contemplations when he came close enough to the dark, bloated shapes to identify them: lying like mummies, humanoid bodies of differing size and build littered the cobbled floor beyond the once-barred wooden door. They were wrapped not in bandages, but in thin, translucent layers of grey-white thread. The shadows of noses and eye sockets and muscles were the only details visible beneath their thick coverings.

Phauran coughed as the musty smell of disturbed dust found his nostrils. It hung like snow in the air before his face in the darkened room, and he did not notice the trap as he stepped forward.

He felt it on the side of his face, his hands, and his torso, the sticking sensation of a complex web, and he knew he was lost.

A shadow expanded in front of him with much clicking of joints and oozing of web material. Then it stabbed forward, and he felt pain, debilitating pain, shooting through his nervous system and causing him to twitch and become more entangled in the web. He screamed, and the tendons of his neck strained at their insertions and stood out like ropes.

The remaining bulk of the gigantic spider descended from the ceiling with nimble ease, scuttled to the web and began disconnecting the strands binding Phauran. He was sure that he would soon be spun in that wicked, suffocating thread and laid on the ground, collecting the copious dust and providing one more meal for the monstrous arachnid.

He perceived the twin flashes of Kharyssa's daggers as she tried to cut the miniscule network of filaments, but she missed entirely in the dark and dust.

However, Grummin's axe struck true, landing a bone-breaking blow on the spider's head and creasing the hairy exoskeleton, sending green fluid splattering. It wetted the dust and sank in, creating a glutinous mixture Grummin felt he would rather not contemplate.

After much hacking, extracting, and agonizing at the web, they managed to free Phauran from it and lay him down on the ground.

As Phauran felt another internal stab of pain flare through his veins, he knew he was poisoned. He screwed his eyes shut and attempted to bring his senses under control. He panted and strained with all his willpower, and finally gained command of his fine feelings, only to find a deep puncture in his lower abdomen, which was leaking blood and a pale, bitter-smelling substance. He cringed, but did not lose his concentration as he extracted the venom and cast a thin ward to contain the blood. Though the pain stiffened his muscles and made him cringe, he grimaced through it and got up, trying not to hunch over.

As they moved on through the bodies and into another long hallway, they heard a series of resounding bangs echoing along the passage from the very end. Phauran's sneaking feeling grew even stronger as they walked, the muffling dust still present.

An almighty, splintering crash signalled the hook horror's breach of the next door. They had caught up with the Drow.

They drew their weapons, knowing that a confrontation was unavoidable, and crouched low to the dust. Kasia ran a light finger along the slight shaft of an arrow as she knocked it and drew it to half tension, ready to let fly. Kharyssa flipped a knife over in the air, gripping the blade. Phauran readied himself for magic. Grummin nervously tapped the ground with the head of his axe. Too loudly.

The cohorts ahead whirled around, drawing weapons effortlessly and falling into a swift stance.

In the time between this and the next combatively relevant event, they had a moment's glimpse of the room. The space was dominated by a long, stone table, which supported the ragged, mummified body wearing an appallingly rusted set of armour. In its right hand, it clutched a brutal-looking Morningstar, and a long javelin lay beside it, almost reduced to another shadow in the collecting dust. Now, however, the corpse rose, eyes opening to reveal vacant sockets, rotted flesh falling from the ancient joints as it staggered upright as a ghastly zombie, looking distinctly confused.

Phauran, Crosaad, Ixpie, Sisuu, Kharyssa, Roaki, Grummin, Solun, Kasia, Kishtoni and Lo'ol all froze, eyes swivelling to focus on the bugbear-sized humanoid reaching for its javelin.

Another instant's hesitation, and then Phauran fired a magic missile at the living bugbear, Kasia let fly uselessly at the hook-horror, and Solun charged, lifting his longsword to a ready position. The speed of that first blow almost rendered Grummin senseless, and thus, he was only able to twist out of the way at the last moment, and caught an upward slash on his breast. He did not reel backwards, though, but banished the pain, using it as a stimulant. The next flurry of blows came with equal speed, but Grummin was ready this time, adapting to the strikes, slowing the devilish sequences with the base of the blade.

The Drow warrior then directed brash stab toward the dwarf's stomach, which would have sliced him open with the flick of the wrist. Grummin saw it coming, and turned it wide with an angle of the flat of his blade. Solun had underestimated Grummin and his imaginative fighting style. The moment he blocked the blow, he thrust his head forward and down. The dark elf did not seize up and go cross-legged, as any idiotic human swordsman would have done out of manly pride, but continued on with renewed ferocity.

Phauran's eyes flashed as he saw the Drow sorcerer gathering an attack and gazing menacingly at Kharyssa, but before he could ready his own magic, he was forced to make a pained dodge as Roaki took a ferocious swipe with his great falchion that split several bricks in the adjacent wall.

In a dark corner to which Kishtoni had retreated, she put her bracers of speed to work. In the span of a second, she placed an arrow in her teeth, behind her ear and in the hand grasping her mastercraft bow, and knocked one. The first four arrows targeted Kasia as a volley, knocking each arrow and letting fly instantly, so that they could barely be seen as a line-up of successive shots. But, in a surprising display of foresight and reflexes, Kasia dove behind the stone table, postponing her own attempts to equip herself. Once she had slid across the dusty floor to the other end of the table, she knocked an arrow as swiftly as she could and let fly. The arrow was true, but Kishtoni had leapt from her hiding place before the arrow had gotten halfway to her, forcing her into the fray, and she had to duck as two furiously grappling creatures, Ixpie and Sisuu, flew past, biting and scratching and choking.

Even as Kishtoni darted through the battle, Crosaad was distracted from his spell-casting by a javelin which had barely missed his right shoulder and bounced off the smashed wall behind the combative elf-wizard, who was locked in combat with Roaki. The zombie knight had regained control of its body, and was bearing down on him. On its way, it levelled its garish Morningstar at Lo'ol, who could not move quickly enough to avoid a shell-cracking blow. But as it raised its weapon and Crosaad prepared to defend himself, several arrows embedded themselves in its armour in quick succession, sending pieces of dislodged bone and dark rust into the air and distracting the monster.

Crosaad redirected his attention to Kharyssa, readying his magic once more.

She was faced off with the hook horror, who was swiping at her with its menacing hooks, missing by smaller margins all the time.

She made a daring jump, using the creature's own knee as a foothold. She sprang up to the level of the creature's shoulder and struck with both daggers. They did not find purchase, and in the moment when she was suspended in the air, daggers uselessly wide, Lo'ol directed the back end of its hook at her and flung her light body aside to sprawl on the table in a cloud of dust.

Crosaad's magic missile shattered a portion of the stone table just short of Kharyssa's limp form to reveal an ornate, golden box.

He summoned the box to him, extracted the scroll within, and illuminated the floor in faerie fire.

His allies turned tail immediately at this signal, and the hook horror bowled through the back wall, opening the way for the Drow and their allied bugbear.

Grummin cursed and made to go after them, but stopped as the Morningstar of the Dark Knight thudded into the ground before him.

His axe came down on it, and broke off the entire arm of the zombie.

Its other hand slashed at Grummin and cuffed him, showering his head in dust and flesh, but otherwise not hurting him.

Phauran sent a stream of flame at the zombie from his open palm. Its armour and flesh disintegrated, leaving no substance but the startlingly white skeleton. It wavered for a moment before Phauran fired a magic missile at its ribcage, shattering its left half. The pelvis and legs fell uselessly to the ground, but the head, arms, and half-torso still crawled resolutely forward, smiling lower jaw open in a soundless scream.

Finally, Phauran grasped the old shaft of the nearby spear, directed it downwards, and drove it through the skull of the Knight. It fell still and crumbled to dust at his feet. He grimaced, satisfied, and turned to help Kharyssa, who was just regaining consciousness.

Once she had shaken her head blearily and declared herself to be fine, they all proceeded to the shattered wall and peered out. The storm had marginally cleared, and a rising sun had broken through the wall of mountains and shone red through the dark clouds. As expected, the Drow and their pet monster had gone.

"Well," sighed Grummin in his gruff way. "At least I got me kill. And this."

The dwarf totted a gleaming, heavy weapon for their inspection. The red sun flashed off its perfect surface. The handle, decorated with a pattern of smooth, rock-hard dragon scales, bore a red gem at its pommel, and merged smoothly to the two golden dragon heads, jaws stretched wide to devour the two blades of the masterwork battleaxe.

They all stared at the blade a moment, then Kasia asked, "What will you do with the old one?"

"What?" Grummin hefted his many-notched, plain-looking axe. "This piece of junk?"

He turned to the exit of the old Tor, held the old weapon behind his back, then slung it , end over end, into the darkness, from which issued a moment later a loud crunch, signalling that it had imbedded itself in the remaining half of the table.

"Fer the next poor bugger who fights the offspring of that damned spider."

Phauran nodded his pained agreement. "Shall we keep moving, then? We need to reach Poisson in good time to resuply."

They set off to the northwest, the sun at their backs, and adventure ahead.

Crosaad stepped from the shadow plane and onto the cobbled streets of the Bazaar. The great pillar of Narbondel shone brightly to the southwest with midday.

The glimmering infrared light that radiated from the massive timepiece felt soothing after the extremes of the blinding sunrise on the surface, and the swirling shadows of the shadow plane, the most expedient plane of travel. The convolution of its physics meant that great distances, such as the journey directly from the Tor to the Undermountain of Waterdeep, and then to Menzobarrenzan, could be completed in shorter time with the appearance of traversing much less ground.

He twisted the plane-traveling ring on his left index finger once, then proceeded alone down the shabby street with quick, decisive strides, leaving the others to whatever business they fancied.

As he walked, he observed that Roaki and Lo'ol would hardly draw a double-take in the seedy commerce district. Goblinoid slaves, both for sale and on duty, shifted large crates which were probably chocked full of contraband products and tugged thick chains bearing all manner of bestial varieties on their heavily-padlocked ends, including hook horrors.

The odd weapons trader or tattoo artist flaunted their respective goods half-heartedly to the largely unhearing crowds. A dull roar of haggling, and the occasional property dispute, hung over the place, but no laughter rang out, and no drinks were shared. This was a place to do business, and get out before you felt a dagger in your back and heard the laughter of a thief or assassin.

When he headed up an incline away from the trading level of the city, the compound of D'A'racraspernion loomed. An opal tower rose to nearly half the height of Narbondel, which spanned the distance from floor to ceiling of the Menzobarrenzan cavern. Its luminescent facets glimmering with internal faerie fire impressed itself upon the eye with splendid extravagance. Its adjacent twin tower was an opal stalactite, an inverted replica of its counterpart and no less awe-inspiring. They were connected near their tips by a Skybridge, a wide, metallic walkway composed of a cage of ademantite spider legs.

After a mile's walk from the Bazzar, he reached the base of the tower, doorless and sheer before the comparatively puny Drow. No fence. He knew, however, that the walls of the gargantuan stone were imbued with a shocking spell that would reduce any who didn't bear the crest of house Do'recranopol to a cloud of dust.

Two minutes of levitation brought Crosaad to the compound's sole entrance, the middle of the tower. It was simple, a headstone-shaped door carved into the luminous rock leading onto one of the many floors of the house's domain. The controversial aspect of this door was that it needed an incantation. This incantation must be spoken in the surface's common tongue, a language taught to all members of D'A'racraspernion.

"_Lawless ousted and royalty sacred_," he muttered. An invisible barrier became a tangible, purple pane of magical energy with Lolth's arachnid crest darkened onto its transparent surface. He stepped onto the hard surface and through the barrier, into the house.

The floor upon which he strode for the umpteenth time in his life alongside the many clerics, mages, scholars and swordsmen present now was of a darker stone than the rest of the tower, but the walls were as iridescent as the outside surface, an unusual quality for a Drow house, as they were rarely places of light. Behind him, the barrier became once more transparent, and he walked to the central spiral staircase.

Climbing to the second floor from the top, he entered the walkway of Skybridge and crossed it, stepping soon into the inverted tower.

After this, another central staircase presented itself. As he walked down it, the stairs bent suddenly down and onto the ceiling. As he proceeded toward this oddity, his body transitioned smoothly into reversed gravity. He was in the tapered end of the open stalactite and the chamber of the matron mother of D'A'racraspernion.

He looked up in detached interest and saw the upside-down thoroughfare of the dark city through the conical ceiling, then returned his attention to the here and now. Torches either side of a spider perched on its smooth abdomen glowed with more ornamental faerie fire, and sitting in the limbs and body of the spider-like throne was Matron Fierlol Do'recranopol, haughty and beautiful with stark white hair and regal features.

Crosaad lowered himself to his knees and averted his eyes as she flicked a long-nailed finger and a trap door closed on the weirdly bending stairs.

"You have completed the task I set you well, male," she admonished evenly, "and in good time, for soon you must leave on another mission." She held out a hand. "The runes?"

He proffered the aged parchment and Fierlol summoned it from his hand immediately and unrolled it.

"Hmm," she breathed ponderously. "It will take time and effort to make these readable in the infrared spectrum, but I am confident that Carnila will complete it promptly." She rolled it and set it on the arm of her chair, regarding Crosaad again with a slightly more excited look. "You will set out for the surface again."

He suppressed a groan, merely donning a pained look on his angular face.

Perhaps Matron Fierlol noticed, for she arched an eyebrow as she continued, "I will give you a spell to shade your eyes, as you will travel in daylight. You will follow the only other lead we have on the locations of the other scrolls; the surface travelers you encountered at the Tor."

"Matron," he said quickly, averse to interrupting the powerful matron, "I do not think that the surface dwellers would know of the artefacts. They looked of poor origin, and did not follow us swiftly. Would it not be more prudent to-"

"Do not question my judgement, Crosaad. You are my first son but nevertheless subordinate to your Matron. We will ply the scroll for further clues while you pursue the travelers. They knew of the scroll. Why else would they have overcome the dangers of Hightower just to head you off at the tomb?" She cut off his protests with a silencing hand and pressed on, "Tail them, and they will lead you to the next step in our divine quest!"

Crossad could not help but look up and see the manic expression on the Matron's face… and wonder at how unholy their task really was.


	3. The Secret of the Windswept Wall

**The Secret of the Windswept Wall**

Solid rock. Nothing but rough, obstinate rock, and it was there; unreachable, hidden. Mottled, wrinkly hands maintained a magical connection to the slightly fogged scrying glass. It was beyond Sionaas's power to view the item with absolute clarity, but the image he was able to summon more than conveyed the viscosity of its defences. The brown-grey colour that was all the wizard could perceive could be only rock.

He freed his hands from their magical bond and ran them over his wizened face with a sigh of weariness. His eyelids translucent, his skin like parchment, his hundred and five years of life had left Sionaas with a wealth of knowledge and a very long beard.

This scrying glass was one of many objects of study in this room: a wooden door in the side of a small study hid a continuously sustained planar portal. Rings enchanted for every use from summoning weapons to summoning daemons were fit onto a mannequin hand on his desk, and numerous books, maps and papers lay strewn across a wooden desk. Even a chunk of rock from the Windswept Wall lay amongst the many diagrams, looking frustratingly ordinary.

One such diagram showed a map of Poisson, the small coastal village beneath the offshoot of the spine of the world called The Windswept Wall, which was visible through the tower window along with a small archipelago of islands off the coast. These islands were home to a troublesome collection of pirate factions, which almost ceaselessly raided the village or else plagued the few trade ships that bothered to pass through Poisson with setbacks and attacks.

Another showed a long tunnel network in the heart of the Wall, a digging project to the very center of Mt. Manyknives.

Sionaas had recently uncovered a fascinating history about a wizard of old named Koral Liernan, practiced in the ways of planar magic and travel, studying their dimensions and distinctions, understanding the laws that govern each one, and growing her knowledge of their every aspect. And from this knowledge, she had created a crystal ball. This extraordinary magical orb enabled the observer to view any location, object, or creature in any plane. As soon as he had read of the item he had known he must have it. He knew that his studies would not be completed without the crystal ball, for it would give him knowledge beyond any wizard in the vast land of Toril.

Thus, he had begun his quest. He knew that he could not use magic; to do so would be too easy, and he was sure that Koral Liernan had enchanted the crystal ball and whatever else was in that trove to teleport if ever magic moved or located it. He was resigned to the only alternative: research, and manual labour. For the latter he had to exploit the population of Poisson. When workers who had first built his tower had finished construction, he had called them to him. He had offered them another job, far higher risk, far higher pay. A majority of them had signed up, and begun their work on the tunnels.

Now, a full two seasons of monotonous labour—on the villagers' parts, of course—and there had been no sign of the trove that they sought, to the effect that several of his workers had resigned in the last month, and Sionaas had a nagging suspicion that more would follow before long. He also suspected that with this lower work compliment something was bound to go wrong. But such portents were to no avail. Risks were not only expected in this project, they were vital. A sudden earthquake might be more than just a natural anomaly; a magical defence mechanism, guarding his prize.

Grummin, Kasia, Phauran and Kharyssa trudged north along the jagged rocks of the Sword Coast, woods to their right, the Sea of Swords close to their left at the bottom of a jagged drop. The white salt spray reflected the sun blindingly into their eyes as they lugged their packs over the broken sandstone and jutting ridges. Far from annoying, however, the water was cool on their hot faces after dragging their luggage so far. Kasia in particular would be exceedingly happy to find an inn and collapse, unmoving, onto a bed, no matter how hard- though, she thought bitterly, she had seen enough beds in her days of solicitation in Luskan.

Grummin was grumbling as ever, but hefting his pack with relative ease on his muscled, dwarven shoulders, wincing as the sun stung his miner's eyes.

Phauran skipped far ahead of the group, nimbly navigating the jagged rock formations with the agility of his fair elven kin. His blonde hair flew in the cool breeze coming in from the rustically-scented ocean. The only one who seemed as easy with their coastal path was Kharyssa. Though she was not as dexterous as the elf ahead, she skimmed across the broken, winding path, driven by the coolness of the white spray and the wind whipping her black hair and poor clothes. As she swung down a steep drop-off by the tip of a tall, rugged sapling, the trees ended, and the Sword Coast opened up.

Stark waters broke upon an expansive, curving shore of mountainous bluffs which gave way inland to an even more gargantuan wall of sheer mountains. Cradled in the fertile intervening space was a town, no where near the scale of Luskan, but developed nonetheless. Its tiled roofs and stony, cemented walls made one think of the Dwarven city of Settlestone. It was made to withstand the tests of nature and time, and, by the battlements set on the edges of the bluffs fortified by massive ballistae and turrets, the odd pirate raid. Though this was the last place one would expect to see any trade, a rocky break-wall had been constructed far below the town and stopped the crashing waves from obliterating a bustling harbour which played host to a dozen sea-faring caravels and barges, ready to pursue the trade routs on the western edge of Faerûn.

As they took in the breathtaking view, the path became cobbled and the rocks became gravel. It took a right turn at a steep hill and they lost sight of the village and mountains. Soon they broke into a restrained trot as they entered onto what seemed to be a road, depressed deeply into the rock and sending up grey, mossy walls on either side, leaving three feet in between. Then, abruptly, the stony walls ended, and the straw-strewn ground began. A couple of feet on, stalls loaded with the wares of recent trade shipments advertised exuberantly with colourfully exotic fruits; jagged weapons of impressively diverse make hung from pegs and racks set outside of a stout smithy; tattoo artists had posted small paintings of multiple designs in front of their own stall and were flaunting their own art on their muscular and heavily coloured bodies. Phauran even spotted some sort of magician sending sparks into the air from his outstretched hands.

Kasia's slow walk veered curiously toward the tattoo stall before a stern hand, that of Phauran, guided her swiftly away and into the buzzing town itself.

As they had observed from the mountain path, the buildings were not ramshackle or gabled, as those in Luskan were, but solid, able to withstand the wind and debris of fierce gales or hurricanes. Though the sky was a pleasing shade of periwinkle blue, the town had a tangible toughness about it. They could all tell that these people were workers, and that it had taken them some time to set their infrastructure in the hostile coastal environment.

A cobbled street wended its way through the stocky edifices and spindly traders' stalls, and then led them through a line of shops selling a range of fine items. Most held new and expensive nautical equipment such as coils of rope and magnetic compasses, but others contained more tourist-oriented things, detailed miniature ships and highly-polished cutlasses prominent in the organized window displays.

At last a robust little inn drew into sight. Kasia groaned with relief, and they all quickened their pace until they had exited the cobbled street and filed through the door into the well-kept lower floor of the place.

They barely took notice of the spacious room filled with wide circular tables and ruffled-looking patrons before Kharyssa threw down the adequate amount of gold and the wearied travelers trooped up the steps to the second floor. The man behind the counter slid the money deftly into a deep pocket and gave them an understanding smile, but they took no notice.

They reached their room on the third floor and Kharyssa immediately dashed through the door and collapsed on one of the two beds with a contented groan. Phauran slid down a wall and opened his book, and Grummin began to dismantle his armour. Kasia also collapsed against the wall, lowering her weapons to the ground, then stood straighter, not moving except to glance at the inviting four-poster on the other side of the wood-panelled room.

After a few moments rubbing sore muscles and blustering at Phauran for not using his wings to carry them, Grummin peered confusedly up at Kasia, his eyes darting from her to the bed, as if feeling that he had missed something. She continued to stand, hands clasped in front of her. She rolled her ankle absently, but stared ahead nevertheless, a glazed expression on her face.

"It's free, ye know," he said awkwardly, gesturing to the vacant bed.

"Oh." She stood stationary for a few long moments in which everyone in the room stared at her. She took one hesitant step forward, then shed her leather vest and fell into the feather bed, massaging the bottom of her tired foot.

No one except Grummin seemed eager to comment on the uncomfortable moment which had just passed, and he was quelled by a sidelong glance from Phauran. They all suspected the cause of Kasia's hesitation, but Phauran felt that they did not need to address it now. For all her past experiences, Kasia could take care of herself.

Although it was a blazing day's morning, they could all feel their energy ebb as Phauran and Grummin unrolled their thick fir travel-beds on the wood-planked floor. They fell asleep within seconds.

The following morning, Kasia did not immediately open her eyes. The light was not as harsh as the previous morning, but from the crisp quality of the air drifting through the window it was still morning, perhaps another morning. The hustle and bustle of the town was familiar to her city-dweller's ears, but pleasantly duller than the thunder of Luskan thoroughfare. However, as her brain freed itself of the befuddlement of sleep, she noticed that it had changed in quality. Voices were shrill, not merry or business-like. Distant cries echoed down from the crags and valleys of the Windswept Wall. She stirred, opened her eyes a sleepy crack, then lifted herself off the mattress high enough to see through the dewy window.

People, men in particular, were streaming up the street below in the direction of the wall, whose grey façade was now veiled in a billowing cloud of dust.

After a few moments' sleepy hesitation, Kasia groped for her quiver and bow and found them lying on the small chest of drawers between her bed and Kharyssa's. As she straightened her dull grey tunic and fastened the weapons about her waist before donning her leather jacket, the others stirred, awoken by the click of her belt clasp. Inserting the metal pegs of her leather jacket into their respective rings on the front seam, she peered more closely through the window at the pandemonium unfolding in the distance. The cloud had settled somewhat, but it was clear that the rockslide, eruption, or earthquake had taken place far to the east of Poisson's outskirts.

Kharyssa and Phauran had jumped up by this time, hastily gathering and securing their own paraphernalia and armour to their bodies, having sensed that something was wrong, though Grummin was still rubbing his eyes, half grumbling, half snoring.

"Ye're doin' nothin' fer me beauty-sleep," Grummin complained, before his bloodshot eyes widened, seeing them preparing so rapidly. With almost unnerving speed, he seemed to spin the belts and plates of his half-plate armour around himself, and had slid the shaft of his masterwork battleaxe into the loop of his belt only seconds later.

They all stood dumb-founded for a full three seconds before Phauran gave him a short, appraising nod, and they all bustled through the door and down the staircase, and later onto the main landing. They dashed across the small, deserted tavern, and burst through the door and onto the street, where they were buffeted by the last few able-bodied villagers to leave for the site of… whatever it was that had happened.

They joined the stragglers and sprinted what they took to be the whole length of Poisson in the span of three minutes in their haste to assist the distressed locals.

They hardly noticed the book stores, bars, and dwellings that they passed on their way out, but kept their eyes fixed eastward. And once they had cleared the buildings, the enormousness of the wall hit them. The peaks seemed to bite the blue sky with their jagged points. Even the valleys stood as grave sentinels over the village of Poisson.

Their awe was forestalled, however, by the crowd of industrious village workers thronged around a large tunnel opening through which issued the cloud of dust that had been so remarkable.

Just as they had broken into a jog, a boy skittered over a small, recent scree to meet them.

"Have you come to help with the rescue?" he jabbered immediately, stumbling to keep up with the swift travelers.

"Yes," Phauran instantly replied. "What is the nature of the rescue?"

"The tunnelers were securing a trench wall when it collapsed. We don't know how many men are trapped down there. We heard yelling, though."

The dark tunnel entrance came into view. Its walls were ribbed in rough increments on the rocky interior by thick, dark wooden beams hung with smoking torches. Two hundred paces on, the fire illuminated a thick talus of broad rocks which had clearly collapsed from an unfortified stretch of ceiling. Hundreds of men and lads had formed four long lines which passed stones out into the sunny outside. Around a hundred of the stones lay in a pile some distance away, more being thrown onto its surface with each passing second.

Grummin hastened through to the front of the line and put his dwarven arms to work, and Phauran hurried with him, readying himself to enact a spell of telekinesis. Kharyssa joined a line, but Kasia noticed something rather odd. An old man, standing on a slope some twenty yards distant. His beard and long, white hair were tossed in the mountain wind and he carried a book under his robed arm, observing the proceedings with an expression of disgruntled resignation.

Kasia climbed a short slope towards the man before he had noticed her.

"You'd better help in the rescue, young lady," he said with a sad smile which did not reach his dull, clouded eyes. "Every able hand is needed."

Kasia's eyes narrowed as the old man tucked his thumbs pensively into the belt of his robes. "You look to be an able hand," she remarked pointedly over the din of rocks and strained voices behind her. It was true. The man's posture was perfectly upright and sprightly, though his lined face and hands alluded to his obvious age and experience, and a rosy glow pervaded his wrinkled face despite his vacant air.

"Oh, there is nothing an aged old warlock like me can accomplish," he replied airily with a wave of his arthritic hand.

"You're a wizard?" she asked sceptically.

The man sighed. "I see that you are intent upon doing nothing. Very well. I am Sionaas, a humble wizard of the coast and traveler of the many mysterious planes, though I frequent this material plane for the odd pint in the village and to keep up with my studies."

"What sorts of studies?" Kasia pressed, now more interested.

The Sionaas's eyes focused on her for the first time that day. "You are interested in the subject? Well, I walk the infinite planes to study things like physics—that is, the way things move and react—the types of things that live in other planes-"

"Like Ixpie," she said, then held her tongue, turning suddenly sheepish under Sionaas's suddenly attentive gaze.

"You know a demonic denizen of another dimension?" he said, a twinkle now kindled in his misted eyes.

"Well," she said, not meeting those strange orbs, "She's not really a demon. She's from our dimension, but she sort of died, then came back. At least that's what Phauran…" her voice tailed away. The old man looked definitely excited now.

"How would you like to come to my tower for tea, say, tonight?" He gazed expectantly at Kasia, who, thinking that it could not do too much more harm, nodded.

A cry echoed up from the tunnel, and Kasia jumped. She had been temporarily unaware that a rescue was going on right behind her for the past five minutes, and stepped back from Sionaas, who smiled, then pointed to a grey structure jutting out from a lesser peak to the south.

"That is my tower. The path up the mountain begins just outside the market there and leads directly to my dwelling. I will be there."

Kasia nodded her acknowledgement and ran back towards the mouth of the tunnel where somebody was yelling, "I've found one! I've got one!"

All pretence of organization forgotten, the villagers had crowded into the tunnel, and Kasia was under threat of suffocation several times as she attempted to navigate the sweaty men, each in varying stages of fatness.

Finally, she came to the wall of rock, which was considerably smaller than when she had last seen it. In the midst of the rock pile, a boy's face cringed with pain, compression forcing all his blood to his purple visage. The men, aided extensively by Grummin, were pulling at the rocks around him and throwing them carelessly behind them.

Finally, they relieved enough pressure from the boy to lift him free of the crushing rock. They gripped him by the armpits and tugged, sending a deluge of loose rock down in his wake. The lad gasped for air, choking on the accumulated soot of several minutes' imprisonment in the wall of stones.

Grummin pushed through the crowd, elbowing obstructing villagers out of his way with an heir of gruff routine. Soon, he had cleared a path, and Kharyssa and another Poisson resident carried the distressed boy from the tunnel.

Kasia followed. They emerged onto the rocky plateau with the boy in tow and set him down carefully. He gulped in the fresh outside air, colour gradually returning to his extremities. As this happened, Kharyssa glanced down at his legs, and her eyes widened with shock. Tiny, swelling lacerations marred the boy's feet. The arrangement of the miniscule puncture marks suggested a very small creature with a diminutive bite radius. When she pointed this out, Phauran suggested that they put it from their minds, as they needed to excavate more people—or bodies.

Thus the monotonous work began, with the fronts of the four lines shifting the large rocks and passing them back through the queue of workers to be thrown on the now-enormous pile. The sun had now passed its zenith in the grey sky, and was descending to the sea horizon at their backs, burning their necks and causing sweat to pour down their necks- especially Phauran, who, oddly enough, was not using any magic, and was suffering for it in the blistering heat.

More bodies were pulled from the grey rubble in the following hours, bearing some of the same, strange wounds as the boy, many more serious. As Kasia chucked a half-eaten corpse back to a burly miner, she realized that the boy had been extremely lucky. These people seemed to have been devoured by swarms of the creatures that had attacked the lad while he lay trapped in the rubble.

Her hands were soon wet with blood thickened by clinging rock dust. It ran down her arms when she raised them to receive another ragged, incomplete corpse and soaked the sides of her shirt, and sweat ran down her face, leaving stark tracks in the thickly caked soot.

At last, the tunnel had been cleared, and the last of the carcasses thrown onto the pile. Only two others had survived their brief entombment, and were catching their breath and choking alongside their comrade. Kasia stumbled out of the mouth of the tunnel, coughing and wringing her hands, attempting to clear them of the glutinous blood now beginning to dry on her shaking fingers. She was soaked, exhausted and uncomfortable and was just sitting down on a small boulder when the others sloped into sight. They looked just as dishevelled and tired as she felt, expressions of gloom and tiredness etched on their grimy faces.

"Three alive!" Kharyssa exclaimed. "Eight dead. That was some collapse. One day we try to sleep in-"

"That miner punched me," Phauran cut in, silencing Kharyssa's complaints at once.

"Why?" Kharyssa spluttered, wringing out the front of her tunic under her leather coat. "We were trying to help them."

"It was when I was about to levitate the rocks. They don't want us to use magic."

"That's odd," Kasia commented absently, searching the skyline. She spotted it, a grey spike silhouetted against the sky now ablaze with the sun, whose rays fell in scattered shafts through the towering clouds of the coast. She followed a craggy line down into the village where it opened on the market just as smoothly as the path through which they had arrived.

"We should return to the inn," Phauran was saying, to a gruff agreement from Grummin, and a grudging concurrence from Kharyssa.

As they began their walk, Grummin posed the question that drew Kasia's attention back to her companions. "So why weren't ye diggin' with us when we got the first lad out?" he asked while dragging a hand through his thick, matted beard, attempting to extract some of the day's grime. "Where were ye?"

"I was talking to Sionaas," she replied, a slightly defensive note in her voice.

"Who?" said Phauran, interested at once.

"The wizard. He was standing on the mountain, just watching, and I went to see if he could help." She hesitated at this point, then, thinking that they would find out sooner or later, ploughed sheepishly on, "Then he asked me if I would visit him in his tower and I… I accepted."

They had stopped now, level with the first buildings of the town. "You what?"

Grummin's tone put her even more on the defensive as she began to feel heat creeping from her ears into her grimy face. "Well I couldn't just refuse. He seemed very interested in me, or rather in Phauran."

Phauran's face whitened. "What did you tell him about me?" he asked sternly.

"Only your name and that you were a wizard," she assured hurriedly. "Nothing significant. Besides," she added, "he asked me to come, not you."

To her surprise, she found it hard to keep a note of pride out of her voice, and it seemed that Phauran detected it as he arched a thin eyebrow. Perhaps he noted her rising colour, however, for his voice was flat as he intoned, "We should get washed, or this soot will colour our skin."

Understanding the discussion to be closed, the group traipsed the rest of the way along the cobbled streets, hardly noticing the families of the dead rushing to the outskirts to discover the gruesome truth.

They found baths on the basement floor of the inn and washed away the mingled dirt and blood.

Once they had washed and eaten a cursory dinner in the rowdy tavern above the baths, Kasia waved to Kharyssa, Phauran and Grummin and set off for Sionaas's tower, leaving her leather jacket and weapons at the inn for politeness's sake. Navigating the market stalls with little difficulty, she found the path beyond an expansive and strange-smelling apothecary. It was paved with fine gravel and was clearly well cared-for. It wound smoothly up into the mountain and bent out of sight into the rocks.

She walked with a brisk pace up the sloping path, slipping occasionally due to the angle of ascent. It was only after several minutes of walking that she emerged into the now-dying sunlight, wiping sweat from her forehead. There, suddenly ten feet away, was the tower, cylindrical and dwarfing, perched high on the very edge of the Windswept Wall. A window at the very top glowed with flickering orange light. There was no one there to greet her. There was, however, a promising-looking door set in the side of the tower, so she approached it, thinking to knock on its dark wood.

As she stepped within a foot of the door, however, a voice spoke, seeming to come from within.

"State your purpose clearly to the center of the door, please."

Kasia blinked rapidly for a few moments before speaking in a wary voice. "Sionaas invited me for tea..."

The door opened with the creak of an internal latch to reveal the wizard himself, wearing a set of loose silk robes and smiling brightly at his new guest beneath his shock of sleek silver hair.

"I'm sorry about that," he apologized, gesturing at the speaking door with a faint grin. "I should have been watching for you but I was distracted at the time." He stepped back from the threshold and extended his arm into the interior of the tower. "Please, enter. I'll pour you some tea."

Kasia climbed, somewhat awkwardly, over the threshold. Though her nervousness had been abated by the man's welcoming manner, there was no disguising the fact that no one had afforded her any gesture so considerate as pouring her a cup of tea in living memory.

It was therefore with some awkwardness that she took a spindly seat next to a scrubbed wooden table and the adjacent stove on which a pewter kettle was whistling merrily. The walls of this room were mainly composed of the curved stone which made up the structure itself, but a large, plain brick division separated this room from what were undoubtedly several more. If this wizard possessed anything extraordinary, it was housed on the upper floors.

"Milk?" Sionaas was looking over his shoulder at her, seeing her taking in the details of the quaint room. "Sugar?"

"Er..." she frowned. Kasia had never given a second's thought to what she might take in her tea. "I don't know," she admitted with a helpless expression. "I've never had tea before."

The old wizard looked faintly bemused. "Never? Well then, I suggest lemon."

After adding a slice of the lemon, a small, yellow fruit Kasia had never seen before, Sionaas sat down on a chair at the nearest corner of the table and passed Kasia a small china mug of steaming liquid. She took it in her hands and raised it to her lips, sipping tentatively. The hot tea burned down her throat and spread throughout her a warm energy. Whether this was from the heat or some chemical property of the drink, Kasia did not know, but she felt a little more at ease.

"Welcome to my tower," he said, waving his arm in a sweeping motion encompassing the little room with the door and the table. "Built by the villagers, you know, and very sturdy. Not the fanciest, but wizards do not need luxury."

"It's charming," Kasia put in, hoping this would suffice in reply.

Sionaas smiled and took a sip from his own mug. "I am glad. And how are you finding Poisson?"

Kasia paused, searching for the right words to describe the remote village. "Scenic," she admonished with a hesitant smile. "One cannot complain of the view." She gestured towards the high-set window and Sionaas gave a short, appreciative laugh.

"Indeed," he agreed, "Few could boast as fine a view as that of the highest floor. It is there that my office and chambers are set for that reason, and it has been most rewarding." He gazed through the window himself, seeming to contemplate it for the first time, then turned back to Kasia. "And where do you and your friends come from?"

Now feeling quite content, Kasia smacked her lips before replying. "We came from Luskan, south along the coast, as you probably know."

"Naturally," Sionaas intoned, bowing his head. "A prestigious band of wizards holds its headquarters there."

"Well, I was a..." she hesitated again, then decided that Sionaas needn't know the whole story. "...a servant in a tavern. The others lived in the slums. I don't know what their situation was."

"I'm sorry to hear about that," he said, taking a pensive sip of tea. "Your friend is a mage, you say?"

Kasia took a gulp from her own cup as she nodded. "He has a massive note book that he carries around with him all the time. He writes things in draconic and elvish and takes notes on everything. He must have completed a diagram of the inn by now."

Sionaas rocked back on his chair and laughed openly, not sounding cracked and old, but whole and energetic. "He sounds uncannily like me. But that is the life of a wizard." His eyes sparkled indulgently as he sat back and said, "My specialty is planar travel."

"Planar travel?" Kasia repeated curiously.

Sionaas smiled and leaned forward. "There are many planes in the multiverse," he began in a hushed tone, "all of them superimposed in parallel states of existence. We live in the prime material plane, but other planes, the astral plane or the demonic plane for example, can be glimpsed, even flitted into, by material beings. Though their physics or appearances can be strange, I tell you the experience is incomparable. In fact, I am searching for a powerful tool of the planar sciences in the mountain."

Kasia did not bother hiding the wonderment stealing over her fine features. "Is it possible for anyone to learn?"

Sionaas nodded seriously, his beard dragging on the table, unnoticed by either of them.

He stood up suddenly, an elated glint returning to his eyes. "Come," he bade, proffering a robed arm. "I must show you."

Kasia stood, not troubling to take his arm. She at once felt a sense of anticipation and, unmistakably, freedom. She did not need his help, she realized, and wondered vaguely why he was still standing with his arm outstretched.

He seemed to catch a glimmer on her brown eyes, for he smiled yet more widely and turned, starting up a set of stairs that curved clockwise around the inside of the tower's stone wall. She followed eagerly, only three steps behind the suddenly energetic wizard. As they climbed, she saw glimpses of different floors on her right. Few were different from the ground floor, some storing sacks of flour or cured meats. Another was filled with mirrors, reflecting beams of moonlight endlessly throughout the room and almost creating the illusion of day, and a third contained a huge library of scrolls and books.

The next floor was a study. The ceiling was composed of bare rafters, supporting a conical, shingled roof, but the windows were decorated with a diamond pattern of stained panes, and there was a fine writing desk against the opposite side of the tower piled with yet more parchment. A round table stood in the middle of the circular room bearing the load of at least two dozen glass spheres. Each was emitting light of varying intensities, which broke into glittering rays on each others' surfaces. Kasia couldn't decide if they were solid or hollow.

"Crystal balls," Sionaas intoned, indicating the glowing objects with a mottled hand. "Tools used to scry places and people on different planes."

The table creaked as he removed one of the balls from the pyramid to reveal a rounded wooden niche and placed it on a claw-shaped holder on the writing desk. "This particular one," he continued, "Scries the prime material plane, but I think you will find it sufficiently awe-inspiring."

He beckoned to her, but Kasia was already on her way. Sionaas smiled yet again.

"What must I do?" she asked, almost breathless.

"You must place your hands on its surface, and close your eyes," he explained, "No more than that."

Without waiting for an invitation, Kasia had placed the palms of her hands on the shining crystal ball, and closed her eyes. Sionaas had been right. There was no spectacle comparable to the upsurge of images and landscapes that filled her mind. Luskan's ramshackle cityscape, the ocean from the clouds, the windswept wall, a crystal ball against a backdrop of black, three drow on the side of a mountain...

She let go and opened her eyes wide enough to make them water.

Sionaas was still smiling. "I know," he said. "That was my exact reaction when I first gazed upon the crystal ball. It is surprising, the number of images come all at once. I expect that your mind was crowded with thoughts and emotions when you touched the ball. You need to approach it with a clear mind and clear intentions, or your befuddled thoughts will bring befuddled images."

"Wow," Kasia said simply.

They sat in silence while Kasia sorted out all she had seen, but she couldn't. It had all been too fast.

Then she glimpsed the dark sky outside, which was a deep purple.

"I should go," she said, with a hint of a sigh. "Thank you for the tea and-" she indicated the crystal ball.

Sionaas bowed deeply. "Any time, my dear," he replied graciously.

They climbed back down the spiral stairs, and Sionaas waved her off the premises.

Kharyssa stared out across the dark water from her clifftop perch, watching a storm brew a mile off the Sword Coast. Lightning flashed across the churning surface of the sea, and the clouds were whipped into the cyclone of wind and rain. Massive swells yielded roaring whitecaps which sent spray high into the flashing air like an inverted rain.

As she watched the roiling cloudscape, the sound of whale-sized waves crashing in the background, she remembered a popular saying in her old home; "Where krakens writhe, it's never dry." Yes, that had been the sort of thing the dark, hardened sailors would have come up with. And it was perfectly true. Apart from their obvious ability to suck the most robust ship into the crushing depths fast enough to make her crews' eardrums explode before they even had time to drown, it was rumoured that some krakens could control weather wherever they were. They preferred the dark and wet by common knowledge, and this storm would have been just the thing that they would have enjoyed. For a moment, Kharyssa teetered on the edge of laughing as she imagined a huge sethropod dabbing tanning oil into its spongy flesh, but then her mind wandered back home and the urge died at once. It had been fifteen years since she had set eyes upon the white shores and lush green flora of the Moonshae Isles and her dark-skinned kin, steadfast elves and hearty men alike. The elven folk had seen to that. They had deemed her birth a disgrace, an intolerable human fraternization, so she, along with her elven father, had been banished and outlawed from their society. Unable to remain on the island for fear of further retribution, they had secured a place on the first merchant ship they could find.

They had set out. Of all her memories, the ship had been grandest. Even now, as she took deep, calming breaths of the salt air, she smelled the smells of the open sea. Hearing the crashing of the breakwall, she heard the white water breaking against the wood-planked hull caked with barnacles and salt. And the sight of the storm brought back the sight of the limitless blue horizon glimpsed through the taught rigging, dotted with the high, battered sail of a lonely ship.

The sound of slapping feet parting the disks of cliff rock startled Kharyssa from her entrancement. Her head came up off her knees and she snatched her hands from around her scrunched legs, placing them behind her and cocking her head to her hunched shoulder as if in casual contemplation.

"Storm's brewin' up," Grummin grumbled as he plopped himself down on the broken clifftop beside Kharyssa. "Gonna be a mother of a rainstorm tonight."

Kharyssa glanced up. The mountainous clouds did seem to be closer than before.

"The elf's scribblin' in his book—for a bleetin' change," Grummin continued, "and the girl's havin' tea with that durned wizard."

Kharyssa peered sidelong at the blustering dwarf, mirroring his look of detached suspicion.

"Ah," the gruff dwarf grunted, waving a gloved hand, "who am I teh judge? The girl can take care o' herself."

"Can she?" said Kharyssa, returning quickly to her skeptical self. "I think that she relies greatly on you and Phauran, myself."

"Bah, quit it, ye're makin' me go red," Grummin responded sarcastically. "She held her own with that drow in the Tor. Some old wizard ain't gonna be much of a problem."

"Phauran is 'some old wizard' too," she pointed out quellingly, flinging one of the disk-like rocks into the open air beyond the cliff, as if to skip it on the distant waters. "He was a match for a drow mage, and he said himself that this Sionaas could be more than he appears."

There was silence for a few moments in which the ocean continued to hiss off the rock faces and ebb raucously back to the blackness.

"Well," Grummin said finally, "I'm headin' back. I'm starvin'."

Grummin got up, tucking his axe into the loop of his belt and leaving Kharyssa to wonder when she had ever seen Grummin without full armor and a heavy weapon.

Kasia pushed the door of the inn inward with a creaking of old hinges, to find a packed tavern. Drinks were set down in foaming mugs and slammed together in raucous toasts, boots were stamped clumsily to the beat of a merry tune played by an energetic band of minstrels on a platform, and at the center of the merriment was the group of workers from the collapse, grinning sheepishly under a bombardment of drink offers and fervent requests to hear more of what had clearly been a riveting tail.

Near to the group around a circular table sat Phauran, Kharyssa and Grummin.

As she approached the table, Phauran pressed one thin finger to his lips and jerked his blond head toward the rowdy group, who had at that moment fallen silent for the speakers in their midst.

"Tell 'em what happened next, Eli," said one of the workers.

"So I was just getting a basket of rocks to haul to the surface," the boy called Eli was saying, "and I heard this cracking noise. I knew it was a collapse, but I just sort of stood still, out of shock, yeah?" he stopped for a moment, clearly relishing the effect of this extraordinary statement. "So, next thing I know, I wake up and it's all dark and it's really hard to breathe. Then I feel this pain in my feet, sort of sharp, not like the rocks, but like something was biting or stinging me. I figure it was some sort of bug, 'cause I heard this skittering and swarming, and then I was pulled out by you folk, but I tell you, I thought I was going to be eaten alive!"

The boy shuddered convincingly, then drank deeply from a small mug offered to him by an awed villager.

Phauran looked around at them with a look that was both exasperated and meaningful.

"Well," said Kasia, absently fingering the grain of the wooden table, "that makes sense. Most of the other bodies were eaten. It wasn't the rockslide that killed them"

"And they were in the rocks for a lot longer than Eli," Phauran added. "He is very fortunate."

At that moment, Grummin stood, dropping the scaled handle of his battleaxe once again into the loop of his thick belt. Kasia looked at him in surprise, Kharyssa with wariness, Phauran passively.

"Where are you going?" they asked almost in unison.

"Just gonna' have a poke around," he replied gruffly. "Can't hurt."

"Yes it can," corrected Kharyssa sternly, not rising. "We've had enough trouble to be getting on with without storming down to any place we know is dangerous."

Grummin snorted. "A few bugs ain't gonna' be a problem. Besides, who else's goin' teh stop 'em if we don't? It didn't look like Sionaas was in the mood to be helpin' when we were diggin' up those bodies." When none of the others spoke or moved, Grummin sighed. "If yeh're all too panzy teh go then I'll be goin' meself teh brave the bugs."

Kasia glanced at Kharyssa and Phauran to see identical expressions of resignation on their faces. They rose and so did she, gathering her bow and quiver from the floor. She had known all along that Grummin at least would not rest until they had gotten to the bottom of any problem, she reflected as she shouldered through the door after Kharyssa, whose breaths came in doubtful sighs through her pointed silence. He was pro-active, a dwarf of action. That was what had compelled him to rescue her from the tavern in Luskan, for which she was deeply grateful.

Thus they made the walk to the tunnel for the second time that day, trudging through the scree and rocks while squinting through the dark to spot the entrance.

It was Phauran, with his innate ability to see clearly in poor light, who found it. The dust had now settled in the rocky entrance and the blood that lay there, giving it a fogged look as they stepped into the yawning gloom.

Grummin advanced into the darkness while Phauran and Kharyssa each went to opposite sides, feeling the stone with their slender fingers and scanning the tunnel with their keen elvish vision. Kasia merely strolled between them, torn between mirth at their fervent examination of the seemingly plain walls and guilt at her inability to help.

Phauran and Kharyssa's hands rippled over the dusty rock for minutes before an anomaly was spotted. Phauran's middle finger slipped deep into the stone through a small hole burrowed smoothly into the solid wall. He surmised that it extended farther, as his finger could not feel the hole narrow even at the extent of its reach. He did not need to point this out to the others, but merely muttered the draconic incantation for the flare spell. The wall lit up, and revealed itself to be pockmarked with holes similar to the first.

"Huh," Kharyssa intoned. "That's the problem, then."

There was an immense thud from behind them, followed by the pattering of falling stones.

They spun around to see a gaping hole where Grummin had stood, some ten feet down the blocked tunnel.

Kharyssa led the way as they dashed across to the broken ground. A short shaft extended into blackness. At the out-of-sight bottom, the clangs of Grummin's rough decent still echoed up into the main tunnel, followed by a disgruntled voice.

"It really is filthy down here."

"Are you hurt?" Phauran half laughed down the echoing shaft.

"Nope," the dwarf grumbled back, "but this bug is."

Phauran snapped his fingers and caused a ball of fire to appear in his hand. Then, he extended a pair of white wings from between his shoulder blades. With these, he did not fly so much as scuttle down into the cramped cavern. With the fire, he illuminated a myriad scratch marks, both minuscule and substantial, indicating burrowers of varying sizes. He made his awkward way to the damp bottom of the space and the ripe, fetid smell of rot reached his sensitive nose and he regretted it instantly. However, he surveyed the dank cavern with an inquisitive eye and almost instantly found the crushed insect. The size of a small rat, it sported an abdomen and thorax, both covered in insectoid armor which had cracked along its length and started to leak a pinkish, viscous fluid. Its jagged, beak-like jaws matched the markings on the boy's feet and shins.

"Looks like we've found our bug," Grummin said, hefting his battleaxe with gusto. "Ready teh find some more?"

The others clambered through the hole and came to a staggering landing at the wet bottom. Just as Kasia landed, a fork of brilliant lightning flashed across the darkening sky outside the tunnel. The sound of rain followed.

"Remind you of anything, this?" muttered Kharyssa slyly.

Grummin glimpsed the fleeing silhouette of a scuttling shape at the disappearing point of the four-foot-high tunnel, and set off at a brisk trot. The others bent low and followed.

Though Grummin strolled along, quite at his ease, the others were almost bent double with the effort of avoiding contact with the ceiling and keeping their weapons raised.

Nevertheless, they advanced warily, eyes raking the darkness for the insects and trying not to breathe through the nose.

Then, all at once, through the billowing darkness, there was an audible crunch, and the bugs leapt from every shadow and cranny.

Kharyssa was quickest to react, slashing with her daggers, bludgeoning the shells under a hail of blows.

Ixpie crept up Phauran's arm and into his hand to receive his shocking spell just as Kasia let fly a clumsily knocked arrow into the darkness. Though this was not aimed, and was intended to do no more than frighten the swarm into retreat, when it whizzed into the tunnel, the thud it made was ominous.

The dark shape they had glimpsed before charged from the dark. It was boar-sized and hunched, its two-sectioned body gleaming red in the light of the faerie fire and eyes full of malice.

It sprang forward on its tangle of legs, reminding Phauran irresistibly of the spider in the Tor of Hightower, and Kasia backed up into a pack of the bugs, which proceeded to bite the backs of her legs.

Just as the huge insect was about to reach Kasia, parting its pincers and opening its jaws, ready to gore, Grummin brought his axe from around his shoulder with a swishing of parting air and contacted on the shell with the notched edge, creasing the bulbous abdomen.

It shrieked a high-pitched, chirping cry and slipped onto its front, then skidded to a stop before Kasia.

It lunged for Grummin next, who batted aside its head and its tusk-like pincers.

Meanwhile, Ixpie soared down into a group of insects, back-flapped, and raked her claws over them to deliver Phauran's contact spell, stunning the lot to accompanying flashes of static.

Kharyssa's daggers sliced more bugs, Phauran's longsword whipped through the air, and Kasia's next arrow hit the large insect in the joint between abdomen and torso.

It screamed again and flailed. It managed one final swipe at Kasia before Grummin's axe cut it in half and dislodged the arrow.

Kharyssa and Phauran cleared away the remaining bugs, then Phauran fell against the wall with a grunt of pain, clutching his right leg which bore a dozen painful lacerations.

"I'll be fine," he mumbled, casting wards around the wounds, then testing the leg gingerly.

Just as a silent calm fell, a distant explosion sent a thick, damp crust of mould from the low ceiling.

While Kharyssa shook her head rigorously, Grummin crept forward. The tunnel widened as he went, soon becoming tall enough for the others to comfortably stand, before stopping in a rounded dead end. It was a cavern of notable size in comparison with the tunnel he had just left, and was dotted with many small burrows. There was also a bulbous anomaly in the desecrated stone. It was a perfectly round bulge, very slightly reflective, and glowing faintly.

"Alright," Kharyssa grumbled, "We've found the problem, so let's be scarce before more of them come."

Grummin pointed to the bulge in the wall, not taking his eyes off it, for it was fascinating.

"What is that?" she asked, no doubt knowing that Grummin knew no better than she.

The other two caught up, sheathing their weapons.

Kasia walked forward, mouth slightly open, hand outstretched. She felt its magic even before she touched its perfect surface. Her fingers touched, and her eyes closed.

A flood of images rushed forth, uncontrollable, overwhelming her mind. Snatches of Luskan, a dark room, two hobgoblins, a drow on a mountainside…

The images faded to blackness then, as the ball rolled from the wall, out of Kasia's grasp and onto the floor of the cavern.

"A crystal ball," Phauran intoned after a few seconds' pause.

Kasia shrugged her leather coat from her shoulders, laid it out on the ground and kicked the ball into it, scooping up the edges and tying it into a makeshift sack which she hoisted over her shoulder.

"We should take this to Sionaas," she said, more forcefully than she had intended, and yet feeling an uplifting sense of leadership similar to what she had felt in Sionaas's tower, and indeed, Kasia began to feel some internal restraint fall away as she led the way back to the opening to the outer tunnel.

The Wings of Flying beat smoothly on either side as Crosaad scanned the mountainside on the Sword Coast. With his eyes unshaded in the night rain, he let his awe rise to the surface at the sight of the towering clouds of water and the openness of the roofless cavern.

Then he returned to his task as he spotted what he was looking for, a small tower, set into the steep side of a mountain. The Matron Fierlol had told him and Solun of these formations, yet they bore no resemblance to the famed Undermountain, which he had visited in his youth. These nearly filled the sky.

Having found his mark, he swooped low to the rocks, setting his bat-like silhouette below that of the towering mountains, and flapped, picking up speed and heading always for the tower. After casting a dispelling ward around his flying form, he burst suddenly above the mountains, climbing, then diving.

Two-hundred feet from the tower's blazing windows, he felt a tug, and the hem of his billowing robe frayed as he broke the domed barrier of the old wizard's casting. Fifty feet, twenty…

He cast a final, solid ward in front of him as he tucked in the tips of his wings and dove, like a demonic succubus, through the top window.

When the wings had retracted, he balled up, lowered his shoulder, and rolled to a casual stance.

And there he was, straightening up at the other end of the expansive study.

The man was speechless, eyes wide with either shock or fear, Crosaad didn't know and didn't care. He waved his hand, keeping a smooth venire all the time to hide his quickening pulse. Crucial.

Four doors opened, two on each side, and out stepped Lo'ol, Roaki, Kishtoni, and Solun, each hefting weapons and deliberately looking imposing, though admittedly Lo'ol, being a hook horror, did not need to try very hard.

Sionaas's eyes were still bulging, though Crosaad now detected fire within those old orbs, when he began working his arms furiously, preparing some unseen spell. Now was the time to act.

Lo'ol charged, his beak-like mouth wide in a roar that rattled the remaining windows before his feet began to slide. He stumbled, attempting to find traction with his clawed feet, but only met the greasy slick of Sionaas's contingency spell.

The blundering beast crashed into the wizard's desk, shattering it into splinters and sending crystal balls rolling in all directions.

Solun took a somewhat more careful approach. He stepped onto the grease and propelled himself forward, sliding past Sionaas and stopping at the wall. Roaki followed suit.

Meanwhile, Kishtoni knocked an arrow, which she let fly with the string at critical tension. It landed on its mark with a splattering thud, its shaft passing halfway through the wizard's gut.

He winced, but continued gesticulating, conjuring a glowing orb of fire. It expanded alarmingly, and Crosaad realized what the old man was about to do a split second before it happened. As Sionaas threw his arms out wide, the fireball released in a blistering shockwave. The tower top exploded. Crosaad lunged at Kishtoni and pinned her to the ground as their hair was whipped instantly across their faces and a hail of brick and tile clattered all around them and onto the mountainside. The fire washed over them, and they felt their clothes, hair, and even their skin burn and blister. Were it not for a timely protective spell from Crosaad, they would have evaporated in the fireball which had carried the roof of the tower clear of its highest room.

Rain suddenly crashed down in a driving sheet and wind tousled their hair anew as they doused the flames on their clothing with their hands. Crosaad threw away his smoking robe, the fabric emitting steam as the rain washed over it. Sionaas was standing at the epicenter, rubbing his knuckles. Lo'ol had his right hook lodged in the planks of wood and was detaching it just as Roaki and Solun removed their fingers from the edges of the creature's shell, the bugbear hefting his great falchion and Solun twirling his single sword in his right hand.

Sionaas lost his coolly satisfied façade as he jerked weirdly under a pair of powerful blows from the hook horror. Fresh spurts of blood joined the rain on his robes. Then, as he began trying to wave his arms again, two more hits were struck across his ribcage, breaking bones, by Roaki and Solun.

Their success was short-lived, however, for when the last blow fell, the wind changed. It blew into their faces, becoming a gust, then a gale, and they felt the grease beneath their feet once more. The three saw Sionaas's triumphant leer and flourishing arms before, with one last blast of wind, they fell. Solun toppled end over end, and Roaki scrabbled at the slicked ground while Lo'ol attempted to imbed its hook in the floor again, to no avail. Solun, Roaki, and Lo'ol went tumbling over the edge and out of sight.

Kishtoni's next arrow was deflected, as was Crosaad's magic missile, as Sionaas conjured yet another fireball. They continued their frantic barrage, wondering at the fate of their three fighting companions, and feeling the heat of the fire build through Sionaas's seemingly impenetrable shielding spell.

Solun saw the fighting and struggled to maintain his grip on the slippery ledge while at the same time reaching downward toward his boot. He lowered his shoulder and raised his boot, feeling the blood pounding through his brain and muscles pulling. At last he felt it, the wire-wrapped hilt of his small throwing dagger. He let his leg fall with relief, and reversed his grip on the weapon, taking aim at the wizard's velvet-dressed back, cocked back his arm, and let fly. The metallic tip slid from between his thumb and forefinger, catching it just enough to give it spin. It pierced his back in the split second in which the protective ward fell and the fireball was about to erupt. The wizard fell as he bled copiously from a hole straight to his heart.

Solun climbed onto the now mercifully gritty floor of the ruined study. Then, as Crosaad approached, they both grabbed hold of one of the dangling bugbear's claws and pulled him up, too. But as they looked down for Lo'ol, a tongue of lightning bisected the raining sky, blinding them. When their vision returned in blotchy clarity, the picture of a distant, shattered shape, met their eyes, stark white shell jaggedly reflecting the stark brightness. The hook horror had fallen from the edge, carried by the wizard's gust of wind, over the mountainside, and into the streets below.

"Damnable pest," Crosaad muttered, kicking a loose stone into the open where Lo'ol had met his death. He turned to Kishtoni, glowering moodily. "Show more restraint over your next pet," he spat.

Kishtoni might have heard the stone clatter on the creature's broken shell, but she was deaf. At that moment sensory input simply did not apply. Lo'ol was gone, crushed by the pull of the world, of the wretched Underdark, she was sure of it. Triel had ousted her mother from Menzoberranzan's foremost thrown, and with her, her tolerance. Kishtoni the shamed noble had ceased to exist, and Kishtoni the shamed outcast was born. Her first home after her dorm with the commoners of Baenre house had been a cave deep in the wilds, the lair of the massive hook horror. But upon overcoming the beast and readying a final arrow, not a merciful impulse occurring to the shamed one, she had held back, gripped by an inexplicable fit of empathy. She was about to take Lo'ol's house, as Triel Baenre had taken hers.

She had spared the beast, named him, and shared his den, before being taken in by Crosaad and his ragtag band for the surface world.

The moment passed. Kishtoni shoved her bow, still strung, around her singed shoulder, and stormed from the room, forcing down her disquiet.

The tower was in sight, and they knew instantly that Sionaas was dead, even before they saw the door bang open. The roof was gone, torn completely away, and the windward wall had crumbled in some parody of erosion under the hail of driving rain. But what emerged from the door was even more unsettling than the condition of the tower.

Three slender, graceful drow elves stood, though they seemed oddly subdued and shuffling, vaguely silhouetted against the dark sky, ebon skin betrayed by glittering flecks of rain, even though the lamps inside the destroyed mountaintop tower had long been extinguished by the wind and rain, completing the cold, derelict feel of the building. Following them was their bugbear servant, still dragging his bloodstained great-falchion. They all seemed rather ragged, however, and a faint smell of burning fabric rose and cooled in the wet night air as the mage's head turned.

The shining orbs widened as they caught sight of Phauran, Kasia, Kharyssa, and Grummin, all struggling along a steep, rocky slope toward them. Somewhat lower than the drow on the slippery mountainside, muscles straining to keep from falling very, very far, they were all fully aware of the seriousness of the situation, but could do next to nothing about it.

As the mage threw a cursory magic-missile down the mountain, Phauran kicked off from the rocks and twisted backward into free-fall, before white birds' wings extended and caught the air, looping him up into an almost vertical climb.

He saw the sorcerer, too, use wings, darker and more bat-like than his, and take flight. The missile which Phauran had dodged impacted on the side of the mountain, causing a mound of stone to fizz and collapse and tumble down to the town below, in all likelihood breaking a window or two. The other three climbed, and the fighters on the high ground readied.

As Kasia climbed, the saw the blur of the archer's hand, and knew that she had only an instant to live. She ducked beneath a large outcropping, which exploded into heated fragments, fraying her nerves and causing her to slip and the sack containing the crystal ball to slip from her shoulders. She fell for one heart-stopping instant, then felt her fingertips connect with jagged rock, and she hung over nothingness.

Grummin was climbing, but a wound to his upper arm seemed to be ailing him where it had not in the adrenaline of defeating the insects. Kharyssa, however, seemed to sprint up the rock rather than climb it.

Above them, Roaki struggled to lift his monumental falchion with trembling arms, and Kishtoni's fingers slipped on her bowstring, letting the recoil graze her arm and jar her so badly that she stumbled backwards.

As Crosaad primed another magic missile, his expression dulled to a fatigued grimace, to be replaced by horror, as his magical projectile fizzed and dissipated in his palm.

A dagger sailed up to burry itself in his thigh, and he reached down, lost control of his flapping wings, and spiraled down into the rainy darkness.

Grummin finally succeeded in cresting the top of the drop and bringing his axe to bear, but not before the bugbear came charging out of nowhere, bowling him over the edge and falling himself, echoing Crosaad's flailing descent. Then came Solun, diving into oblivion as Grummin tumbled end over end, and only missing Kharyssa because she flattened herself to the cliff as he went by. Finally Kishtoni slung her bow around her shoulder and spread-eagled over the dark drop, overtaking the falling dwarf.

Phauran tucked his wings and dove, a white spearhead in the rain and wind.

Grummin was falling fast, gaining speed. His head-first drop was taking him closer and closer to a shimmering rectangular portal.

Phauran's hand closed around the dwarf's ankle and he back-flapped furiously. Grummin flailed for a moment, his red beard dangling into the sheet of light. Then, it disappeared, bearing the end of Grummin's impeccably braded beard to a far-off, dark place.

"Cowards," Grummin huffed, "them drow'll get what's comin' to 'em one o' these days."

"Let's hope that day waits for when the weather is clearer," cautioned Kharyssa as she helped Kasia onto level ground.

As Sionaas was no longer able to help, they were left to wonder at the crystal ball as they walked, through the town to the inn, noting the shattered hook-horror lying atop the tattoo stand in the market.

But when they gathered their packs and bedding the next day, it was with an air of reminiscent fondness that they looked back at the town of Poisson as they took to the roads and the adventures the north held in store.

In the tip of the Do'recranopol stalactite, there was total, oppressive silence. The transparent, up-side-down ceiling revealed as ever the glittering carpet of faerie fire and towering peeks of compounds and towers, the stalactites hanging to make the cityscape look like a sea of teeth, faintly illuminated by Narbondel.

The first voice to break the quiet was that of Matron Fierlol.

"So you let them escape," she scorned through her teeth. "A party of surface urchins!" The resonance of the powerful matron's fury reverberated through the inverted room like the low, condemning octave of an organ.

"We were half dead," Crosaad protested, his voice echoing lamely in the transparent chamber. "The wizard was powerful."

The matron erected a slender hand to bring silence, her eyes deadly beneath her raised hood. "Tell what you know."

Crosaad clenched his teeth, then spoke. "The wizard had been digging some time before we arrived, using a labor force, for he feared that to use magic to extract it would set off defenses and place the artifact beyond his reach. He was looking for a certain crystal ball, as you informed us." He nodded towards her haughty figure. "The surface-dwellers found it first. They used a network of biter tunnels to find the ball and take it. When we returned to the mountain to retrieve it, they met us, and we had to flee, for our wounds were too grievous, and I could no longer use arcane magic." The infuriating aspect of this interview was not the embarrassment of failure, he could cope with that quite readily, but the fact that his mother had been right in saying that the party had not been passing travelers. They were, in fact, intent upon the same goals as house Do'recranopol. He had been completely wrong.

"Since you and your…" smirking, she paused for a moment, appearing to search for the appropriate term, "…companions can no longer guarantee success, I shall have to take a greater hand in your missions."

She motioned to his right, indicating a female in a handsome, sheer Lolthite robe.

"Chlorr'yannah will be your supervisor and my mouthpiece on your escapades. She will maintain discipline and ensure your absolute cooperation."

He did not doubt this claim. The female's eyes glowed a fearsome red, and there was an air of meticulous obedience about her. Crosaad could immediately tell that she would do her job well, and, from the evident disgust on her lack face, she would find their continuing excursions to the surface just as unpleasant as he would.


	4. Frozen Whispers

**Frozen Whispers**

Though the press of winter seeped back into the far north upon the end of the season on the vast world of Toril, though the burden of snow was lifted from every farmer's field and the roofs of granaries and plantations, revealing the mulch of last autumn's harvest and rotted thatch, and the dwarves and goblins of the spine emerged from their deep homes, two far-flung places in the land of Faerun never felt such pleasant sensations. In the forbidding Lurkwood ever-shadowed trees strew snow-capped and unbroken before the grey horizon, and the wintry oppression pressed down on the negligible presence of life like a cold duvet. In the malevolent Underdark, beneath the defrosting ground, the clay and bedrock, and the stalactites beneath those, seasons were neither seen nor observed by the daily comings and goings, and the ever-present flare and fade of Narbondel, the timepiece of Menzoberranzan, and sibilant creatures of innumerable ilk and class skulked in the quiet darkness of the cavern, waiting to strike out at whoever was so unfortunate as to disturb its patient contemplation. But these places had something else in common, seeming singularly trivial in the grand scheme of cold permanence, yet a force whose destinies were intertwined the likes of which the deities of the Realms had rarely detected. Two bands: The travelers trekking in the Lurkwood, and the pursuers, pondering the former's passage through the trees, to the north, and to a freedom that Fierlol Do'recranopol would make sure they would never attain.

Phauran lifted his hands from the orb lying in a rough, splayed fur before him amid a tangle of long-dead or petrified grass and pine needles. He was on his knees. The hard permafrost had melted beneath him and soaked through his loose breaches and the hem of his patched robe, awakening him to a whole new depth of icy discomfort. Stabs of paralyzing chills shot sporadically up his spine and through his scalp to grip his skin like a hand pulling at his long, blonde hair. He moved, and felt more of the damp breaches press to his legs, causing the skin of his forehead to stretch and crawl.

A fire was all that lit the dense thicket of trees beneath the snowy canopy and, apart from his own body heat, melted the snow within a five foot radius. It burned well, despite the ever-present cold, and played upon three huddled forms, casting flickering shadows in their wakes. Their bulk was due to yet more furs, which shielded them from the low temperature as they lay on their bedrolls, but nevertheless, they were discernable to Phauran, who knew them well. He first marked Grummin on his stocky build and three-and-a-half-foot stature, whose shadow did not entirely eclipse the glimmer of a honed and notched axe blade. To the left of the snoring dwarf lay Kharyssa, her half-elf's ears pointing into the frosty air, illuminated by the crackling fire to be chocolaty brown in hue, like her slender but determined face. Farther left still, a curvier shape rippled beneath a much heavier fur, which almost entirely muffled the fine, pixie-cut hair and beautiful visage of Kasia, the once-slave-girl turned archer. Though she had only been with their group a year, the same air of hard-won grace emanated from the shivering eighteen-year-old, an effect no doubt brought on by past years' hardships. Six months ago, through an unfortunate sequence of events, they had come upon a band of drow in a raging lightning storm by the famous Tor of Hightower. Storm Peace had been declared. The Tor soon opened, and all of them had fled to the safety of its ancient confines. The drow had fought and fled, before the entrance collapsed and they themselves had been forced deeper into the structure. After that they had confronted the drow party, and escaped with their lives. Barely a month later, they had encountered them again, in the coastal town of Poisson. Though they did not know the reason for their presence immediately, it soon became apparent that they were looking for the very crystal ball which Phauran now studied. And then they had just… disappeared. Though they had camped on the Sword Coast for three months, waiting out the winter before making their bid for Tentowns through the treacherous Fell Pass, they had not been set upon again. And now they definitely knew that they were being pursued, and that the enemy was biding its time, perhaps compensating for the recent loss of their hook horror at Poisson. They were no longer running from the authorities of Luskan for the murder of a cruel slaver, but from the forces of a ruthless and powerful drow house.

Here, however, their ambitions had been curbed somewhat by the clutching branches and pervasive snow of the forest. Six days had put them beyond thought of much more than a warm bend, and fresh, unspoiled meat, and so they had set their sights on the Bluerock Lodge thirty miles into the wretched Lurkwood.

Their goal thusly set, they had set out from the coast with their packs full of salted meat, berries, and local fish, all crushed into an unattractive but long-lasting pemmican mix and bundles of rolled furs and bedrolls. But Grummin, by dint of his stocky stature, moved slowly, and the forest was a challenge even with the preserved food and thick furs, and so their week had been slow and frustrating, placing them several miles behind on their original, and foolishly optimistic, estimation.

Kharyssa stirred as a log fell and sent sparks high into the air, and placed her forearms on the hard ground, shivering at the contact as she slowly straightened and twisted the kinks out of her neck.

"You must have been studying that thing for six hours now, Phauran," she grumbled wearily. "What more do you think you are going to find?"

Phauran collapsed, exhausted, onto his own bedroll, the crystal ball winding him as it bounced atop his hollow gut. "I honestly don't know. This object contains a vast amount of comprehensive knowledge, so I can theoretically see anything, but then I haven't the faintest clue where to begin."

"But that's not our prime concern," she commented, suddenly solemn. Phauran even sensed a berating note in his old friend's voice. "Our supplies are running low. We need to hunt. Tomorrow. We all need warm food, especially Grummin. He may be hearty of body, but his stomach is on the brink. I see the symptoms daily. And Kasia weary of the cold." She stared into Phauran's eyes, searching for the answer she needed. "Above all, we need to make it to Bluerock lodge within three days."

Phauran nodded and smiled reassuringly, though he did not think that this would convince the jaded woman from Luskan's Warren. "Peace, Kharyssa. I do not have sole initiative in this camp. We will all hunt tomorrow, gods willing, and then continue to Bluerock lodge with full bellies and packs. All will be well, for it must be." He still sensed her doubtfulness, but, being too tired from his scrying, he gave it up. After all, he reflected, it had not been much of a rebuttal simply that divine powers were vying for their survival, as if they were of some cosmic significance. But he was sure he was right, that they must survive. Otherwise, they would be dead.

Without another word, he let the orb roll to the ground and covered himself with his own thick fur, settling down into a much-needed sleep.

The Narbondellyn expanse spanned out before them, all faerie fire and distant, shimmering emblems, in every colour of both the infrared and the visible spectrum. Kishtoni viewed it from the latter spectrum this day, an anomaly, as habit and survival instinct had long since overridden aesthetic appreciation of the great cavernous city. Of late, however, this tendency had inhibited and fooled her in unexpected ways. Being unable to detect such environs as shadow and light, a week ago she had been awakened to her new vulnerability when a common slave goblin had snuck up behind her in the glare of Narbondel, and had it not been for her keen hearing skills and certain innate supersensory abilities, she would have been skewered on the beast's muddy shiv. Also, she had only a day ago narrowly escaped the lewd advances of a lower-house priestess.

Therefore, Kishtoni fully intended to insinuate these light-sensing stints into her weekly—if not daily—ritual.

However, she hadn't much time to pursue this new ritual. Their layover in Menzoberranzan for Crosaad to re-grow his Wings of Flying, ruined by the deceased sorcerer, Sionaas, had given them several weeks' rest. But now that was drawing to a close. Their new House-proclaimed leader, Chlorr'yannah, was restless to continue their crusade against the surface-dwellers, and she was not to be delayed for long.

Kishtoni drew an arrow from her full quiver and strung her bow, almost at the same time, with her bracers of speed, and then slowed down, taking careful aim from the rigid landmark of her arm to the head of a rowdy bugbear, which seemed to be herding a swarm of exquisite centipedes with the help of two squeamish hobgoblins. She saw the light shining bloody and greasy on his matted fur, and the chords of his muscled neck. It was oddly distorted, but, she thought, that was no doubt due to her current ineptitude in the area of normal vision, and would soon be rectified.

She let fly, and the arrow soared in a well-judged arc… and landed with an echoing crack in the carapace of a particularly reluctant centipede, which proceeded to writhe and flail, skinning the muscled front from the frantic bugbear with its sharp, teeming legs.

The bugbear collapsed in a bloody heap, his flock now crawling happily over his twitching body, and Kishtoni cursed dispassionately. The beast's shadow must have tricked her. But she had not wasted a very fine arrow, and she had always known that it would take practice. She smiled ruefully. Someone high up in House Do'recranopol would not get their seared insect tonight.

"Shamed One," barked a voice from the end of the corridor behind her, making her wince and hunch her shoulders resignedly. She knew that voice.

She turned and averted her eyes, but still saw the sharply pointed Fisher-hide boots of Chlorr'yannah stepping heavily towards her. She hunched even more, capitalizing on her slight stature, because she knew that the bucksome drow priestess loved it.

"What have you been doing here?"

Kishtoni did not answer, as speaking the drow language to this one would probably mean a sound whipping.

"Your presence is required on the second level," she stated curtly, and Kishtoni still sensed her sharp eyes burning into the top of her bowed, black-haired head, daring her to meet her gaze. "Bring your weapons. Move, Shamed One."

They moved through the tight side-passages striating the stalagmite, their reflections undulating in the artfully-hewn facets of opal. Kishtoni felt a conflicting mixture of security and foreboding as they strode deeper and deeper into the heart of D'a'racraspernion and she felt her bow and the quiver of arrows strapped tight to the back of her plain, black tunic. Though she was reassured by their bracing presence, she could not stop herself from speculating as to what she could possibly need her weapons for in this secure compound.

And her ominous feeling increased still further when the crystalline walls lifted away, giving way to hard earth reinforced by webs of Ademantite and hung with fuelless, shaded blue flames. When they had ventured thirty feet below the floor of Menzoberranzan, Chlorr'yannah turned to her, stopping cold in the dark hallway. She gestured to her left, Kishtoni's right, toward the centre of the tower and a door, which swung open, leaving a dark, empty space where it had once joined perfectly to the surrounding wall. Kishtoni hesitated for one moment more as she wrestled with her instincts, then stepped in.

It was darker, quieter, even than the concourse outside, for it was hung not with blue-burning tapers, but with weapons. Maces, swords and scythes, scimitars and falchions, flamberges and kukris dangled from hooks on inward-sloping walls so thick that the ceiling seemed razor sharp, the points and spikes but six and a half feet from the pit sinking into the centre of the small room. It was a rough cross of armoury and arena, and Kishtoni didn't like the feeling that she was standing at the points of hundreds of swords. She had a great liking of open spaces and high perches from which she could comfortably shoot her arrows, and this was quite the opposite.

Shifting back to infra vision, she perceived the dormant warmth of a body in a far niche, a place cleared of the oppressive thatch of steel. A long rasping sound and the heat of many sparks along a thin line suggested the sharpening of a blade.

"Houseless," Chlorr'yannah called. The shape of red and blue stirred and rose, sheathing the blade. It was another female. She was beautiful, with a thin, proud face, but this did not concern Kishtoni, for beauty was a common trait among her kin. More important was her body. This one was lean and powerful. Muscles curved subtly beneath the plain leather with no emblem. At her hip, the necks of five snakes curled and writhed poisonously against her side as she walked forward, head held high.

Another movement to the right. Matron Fierlol had arrived through a second door, haughty as ever in purple robes bearing a large spider branded on its torso in thin, red thread with the emblem of House Do'recranopol. Both Chlorr'yannah and Kishtoni bowed, though the unknown female stood resolute in the middle of the pit.

"Do not bow, Kishtoni the Shamed," Fierlol crooned in an entirely dangerous voice. "You are now no longer a member of this house." These words hung in the air and tautened the silence that hung in the dark room. She opened her mouth to speak.

"Do not speak, either. The status of you and this houseless," she gestured toward the resolute female, "is now equal. You were brought to us, out of the streets of Menzoberranzan, by the charity of one of our mages." At this, a slight smirk played across her thin face. "This counted for much more before his actions on the surface world expelled him from the esteemed favour of his Matron. Therefore we feel the need to… clean house." She nodded once again to the female. "She has also pleaded for sanctuary, and she may prove more useful to us than you can be. To ensure that we make the right choice, you will fight for your place in D'a'racraspernion."

Fierlol stopped abruptly at the sound of footsteps outside. They were running, not endeavouring to remain silent, and were coming closer. A moment later, the door through which the Matron Mother had entered burst open, and a robed, handsome male stepped in, panting slightly.

"Matron Mother," he said hoarsely. "I protest. Kishtoni is my responsibility."

"No longer, Crosaad Do'recranopol. She is now the domain of your house." She turned back to the room, leaving Crosaad seething, his black fists clenched at his sides, scrutinizing Kishtoni intensely. "Proceed."

The female squared up, drawing a short scimitar and her writhing, five-headed snake whip, smirking as she stepped back from the centre to allow room for Kishtoni, but she hesitated, pondering her situation. This was a small room, with many daggers and swords which would suite it much better than her bow, but on the other hand, she was supposed to be proving her worth. What was more, she realized as she watched the female flex her muscles expectantly, she was far more powerful than Kishtoni. In close combat, those snakes would rake her flesh while the scimitar slashed her in two. She would suffer a most painful death indeed.

She decided, pulled her bow from its leather sheath, and strung it, waiting with her drawing hand raised to eye level for an opening she knew would come.

As they were only about four feet apart, the female smirked even more broadly, raised the whip above her head and charged. She could not control the heads of her snake whip, and they were braiding and twisting together, no doubt because she had lost her clerical powers.

Kishtoni reached with lightning speed for her only hope, placed them to the string, and let fly. The sound of cutting air, and many sparks were all the warning the houseless had before five snake heads flew free of their bodies, severed by five arrows.

Before the female could even utter a scream of rage, Kishtoni dodged left, feeling the stumps of the whip grazing her shoulder, fitting another arrow to the string and letting go.

Heralding this arrow's passage was a spray of blood as the houseless's throat opened, exposing a gory oesophagus to open air.

She dropped her weapons, fell to the stone floor, squirmed for a moment, then died.

Very slowly, Kishtoni unstrung her bow and tucked it behind her back. She saw Crosaad smiling and looking quite satisfied, but, she turned to see, Chlorr'yannah was quivering with rage, and clutching her own whip in her hand.

It did not occur to Kishtoni to resist. She felt the fangs pierce her arms and torso again and again, heard Crosaad's shouts of protest, and Chlorr'yannah's angry panting.

Minutes later, it seemed, she emerged, wheezing, from the inner retreats of her paralyzed brain to hear more shouting. She could tell that she was curled into a ball, and that she bore many shallow wounds, but these all hurt very badly, and she could not see, for her vision was shrouded by a black, sickening cloud.

"She has won her fight, priestess, and now she is under my command. Leave her, or she will not be fit to walk the surface world when we set out."

"That is just as well, male, for she is shamed, and fit for nothing but sport and death. If she is not ready, then so be it. My conscience will not suffer."

She heard no more words, but striding footsteps, those of Crosaad, she reasoned, for they were the light steps of a male, carrying much less muscle than the priestess, and then she felt arms pick up her paralyzed body with little difficulty. He began to walk again, out of the armoury and into the concourse outside at a fast pace.

Kishtoni tried to move, to support her own weight, but her muscles were still seized forcing her to a pathetic foetal position, and in any case, Crosaad tightened his hold as she struggled, plainly indicating that she was not to move.

Finally, she heard a door swing open, and was placed on her side upon a soft, slightly chilly surface, and heard the soft tinkling of phials and decanters from several feet away.

"Why did you not fight back?" came an agitated voice from the same direction.

Kishtoni felt an excruciating pain on her side. Was vaguely aware of a harsh liquid on her skin.

"You have seriously jeopardized your survival in this house. If you do not live up to the expected level of usefulness, they will cast you out."

One by one, she felt convulsive pain, and then let the muscle relax and go limp. This repeated many times until she was almost entirely numb. Through blurred eyes, she saw Crosaad place the potion on a small desk, and then pull out a silk cloth and begin to prepare a poultice.

She noticed that he had pulled off her black tunic to gain access to the small wounds, groped sluggishly for the shirt, and, feeling it lying across what felt like the headboard of a bed, pulled it towards her.

Crosaad came forward again and tugged the shirt from her grip. "No good," he said gruffly. "That is poisoned still. It would only enflame the wounds." He sat down beside her and pressed the poultice wordlessly to her eyes. "Sleep," he said as liquid, much less harsh than the muscle relaxant, seeped from the cloth.

She did indeed realize that she was extremely tired, and, not even shifting to a more comfortable position, fell into a dreamless sleep.

A sudden cold interrupted the oblivion of dreams. The old nightmare imploded, the desperate face of an old dwarf he knew not from what long dead recess of his enigmatic psyche. Another drop of cold made his eyes open. Snow was slowly drifting off a low-hanging branch protruding from a leaning sapling in the frosty brightness of morning, another morning in which cold and exhaustion ruled.

He sat up reluctantly, stretching the knot in his back from a gnarled root under his bed roll and shaking his red beard and hair free of water. A fresh fall of snow had come in the night, it seamed, for the canopy of interweaving branches was likewise weighed down with snow, filtering what must be brilliant sunlight above into a muted blue that was cool to Grummin's pouchy eyelids.

He redirected his attention to the other three who were all except, inexplicably, Phauran, similarly hangdog from the night's tossings and turnings. They all groaned, stretched, and began to mill about and collect their few possessions.

Soon their bedrolls, belongings, armour, weapons, and tinder box were all stowed away in hide packs and slung on the backs of their owners without a single word. They had all said their good mornings too often to bother observing the custom any longer. After a hurried breakfast of their basic supplement of crushed berries and fat and a ration of melt water each, they set out.

Navigating the wet brush and close trees was a lot harder than it seemed on first sight. Their packs snagged on the branches, much to the expense of the ones behind, who were whipped in the face by soggy foliage and invariably spluttered endlessly for the next few minutes. More than that, ropes, pots, and belts were in constant danger of being left behind on branches where they caught and hung themselves, unnoticed in the kafuffle. All of this kept them tense and irritable, but most of all, they were hungry at the end of the day.

This day, the undergrowth was so dense that they placed Grummin ahead with his axe to hack away into their path, slowing their progress still further. This also presented the complication that Grummin was barely as tall as the chest of a human, and thus the height of their trail was inconsistent at best.

But they trudged onward, haltingly and with grim faces and boots full of snow.

This day, they felt the famine of meatless weeks eating at their stomachs, and were therefore enthralled by the discovery they soon made.

Once again in the lead, chopping at the conifers in their path, Grummin stopped, quite suddenly.

He felt the others moments later pressing on his back, surprised at his sudden halt. After seconds of teetering on the edge of confusion, however, they all spotted it too.

A small patch of a tree some feet away lay bare of its frosty bark, though a twinkling cirrus of something darker was crystallized on its scarred surface.

Intrigued, Grummin hacked away with a renewed vigour, the others catching their hair on the top of the substandard openings in the wood as the dwarf made his way hastily to the tree. The dark stain on the holes of burrowing insects and rippling of knotholes was blood, smeared irregularly up the trunk. The snow around it showed the shadows of a disturbance that had happened at least a day ago.

"Do ye reckon it was a deer?" he asked excitedly, poking the tree trunk experimentally with the end of his battleaxe and teasing a chip of brown residue off its scarred surface. They all recognized the plea behind the question, and understood it. They all wanted fresh meat, and all wanted this to be a sign that a vulnerable quarry was only a day away.

But Kharyssa shook her head sadly as she analysed the scene with her hunter's eye. "The prints on the ground," she said, pointing to the scrambled patch of ground at the tree's base, "are not those of the small hooves of the deer. They were made by something bigger; a bear, wolf, or something else which could sweep into such patterns." She too touched the bloody tree then, frowning. "And this bark was scratched away. No deer did this."

Grummin imbedded a hatchet bitterly into the tree, and applied himself to wrenching it out, so that he needn't look at the others.

However, it was a strange scene. A wild animal stumbling upon a tree and scratching until its blood ran from its fingers? It bespoke insanity or irrational fear.

But they assumed that it would remain forever an enigma as they gritted their teeth and bore their disappointment. They slashed farther, though more slowly, for the next hour, encountering nothing abnormal and scattering the flitting wildlife.

Once again, the forest seemed endless in its uniformity. A feeling of walking in circles itched at the backs of their minds, making them grit their teeth to stave off panic and focus ahead, at their goal.

Quite suddenly, as Grummin hacked away another branch and made to force ahead, he stumbled out into a clear patch, breaking quite free of the repetitive trees. The difference was so sudden that he registered nothing but a slight dizziness that fogged the perceptions of his senses. Then he saw the ground at his feet: smooth, packed dirt, hardened with the permafrost of a long winter.

He looked left, then right, and saw the greyish path stretching into gloomy obscurity as it was swallowed by the snow-laden canopy.

The others exited the trees somewhat more gracefully than Grummin and peered about, into the edges of what was unmistakably a rough trail.

"East to west, by my reckoning," Kasia noted with disinterest. "Must be for hunting. But we can't use it."

It was true. Bluerock lodge lay miles yet to the north. A sidetrack of this magnitude could cost them perhaps a week, something that their morale could not bear.

"Bah," growled Grummin unexpectedly, scratching his beard thoughtfully as he glanced to and fro. "A road, a good n' solid road, wasted!" He looked east. "We should follow it." The others looked upon him with incredulity and sympathy. They all wished to witness some semblance of civilization on the dark and lonely trek, but letting it tempt them into misdirection was folly.

"Grummin, we must—"

"Hunters use this path," Grummin remarked redundantly, "so how do they survive? Suren they don't carry their tents around while they're stalkin'. They'd have to have cabins."

"Grummin, we can't risk that," Kharyssa counselled gently.

"Risk?" the stubborn dwarf said, now impatient. "We'll get to the damn lodge one way or another. We're behind as it is, so we can all spare a few days te find better accommodations, eh?"

The others hesitated, still unsure, although Kasia looked keener that the others.

"We need to find meat, and what better place to do it from than a hunter's cabin? Besides, I wouldn't say no to a proper roof over my head for a change."

They relented, with grudging glances and jostling of packs in preparation for a long walk.

Beginning to walk, though, they were grateful for the lack of branches and space to think. They could inhale the cold air and anticipate the comfort that they might enjoy. The only things of which they needed to be conscious were the occasional frozen roots and protruding bits of pebble-packed dirt.

They saw slivers of cloudy light through breaks in the trees, and skeletal shadows on the beaten path in front of them, turning night to twilight, and making it harder to see imperfections.

They saw a shadow ahead, about thirty metres on, suggesting an angular polygon. It was dark, with indefinite lines and one upright rectangle in the middle.

Kasia and Kharyssa cried out with glee, Phauran smiled, and Grummin tucked his thumbs under his belt, satisfied.

They jogged forward, clearly anticipating a warm night's sleep and shelter and food. But before they got within ten paces, Phauran stopped. "Wait," he cautioned quietly, reaching for his sword. "We should check it first."

Grummin understood. The snow was everywhere, and the woodland creatures must find it just as uncomfortable as they did. What might they do if they found an unlocked, intact cabin?

The dwarf stepped forward, axe in his right hand and his left reaching for the iron latch on the left side of the door.

It burst outward and bounced off the log wall as a furry, doglike shape pounced on Grummin and bore him easily to the ground, shocked as he was. A long tail whipped behind its grey-furred, muscled body, ending in a dark tuft. Its head, encircled by a shaggy mane, opened its feline mouth and prepared to snap up Grummin's sweating nose.

The others advanced frantically, drawing weapons as Grummin clamped his gauntleted hands over the thing's jaws in a clumsy attempt to ward it off. As it was, the white teeth opened and closed hungrily, inches away from him.

Phauran came in first, his longsword slicing up to cut a gash in the large cat's side. The metal bit into furry flesh and trailed a ribbon of crimson which spattered the snow, dotting it a shocking red.

It faltered, but did not desist in its attempt to savage Grummin.

Kharyssa drew her dagger, blade up, and punched it upwards, impaling it through a rib and lifting it off of Grummin with a strained grunt of effort.

The thing rolled away, flailing and whipping crimson snow into the air as it struggled with a lopsided gait to make its way into the nearby trees.

They all looked to Grummin, who was getting up and robustly wiping saliva off his face and pulling it out of his black hair.

"After you," he offered, with a somewhat peevish note.

Kasia loosened her bowstring but kept the arrow knocked as she stepped forward with the rest of them.

The door loomed, dark and unknown before them, and yet inviting, as if its sheltered, enclosed air created an imperceptible vacuum.

Kharyssa was the first to cross the threshold and swiftly take in the small cabin's interior with a glance from side to side. She half turned back and beckoned, one dagger still in each hand, for them to approach.

They did so with relief.

All four of them immediately realized the extent of their reprieve in the instant it took to observe their surroundings. Across from the door squatted a small woodstove with dried wood stacked neatly against the adjacent wall. To their right a rack jutted out, evidently for hanging coats, pelts, and other such items, and to their left lay a bed, covered in several layers of blankets, with another few rolled at the foot.

Kasia groaned with relief, and the others nodded appreciatively by her side.

"It's perfect," remarked Kharyssa. "For a night. We can't expect this fortune every night."

Grummin smiled sarcastically. "Don't get too excited, Kharyssa. We're only stayin' for a day."

Kharyssa chuckled, and dropped her pack to the wooden floor.

The shadow plane was obscure as ever. An arch of land could be felt underfoot, pitted and uneven, and caught on the soles of their boots, and the shadow around them rippled and frayed, making every shape indistinct. And there were many shapes. Beasts and demons crawled along obscure surfaces that melted in and out of being, and then dissolved back into the rippling mass.

Chlorr'yannah led the group along the never-ending, winding and uneven archway, her strides confident and forceful against the constant gale of wind and howls issuing from who knew how many foul breaths. Followed by three drow and a bugbear she forged on without fear or heed of her surroundings.

The bugbear's growls added to the horrible din around them. Roaki was in great discomfort, flapping his arms around him for reasons best known to himself. Perhaps to ward off the almost tangible shadow, perhaps to maintain a grip on his body's distorted borders. Solun tapped the bugbear impatiently in the back, a place he knew from experience his old servant would feel, and when the brute looked back, indicated the direction in which they were walking. Understanding this as an order, the bugbear did not bother to respond as sound did not travel here as it did in the prime material plane.

Crosaad and Kishtoni kept their peace, responding neither to Roaki's discomfort nor to Chlorr'yannah's relentless pace.

It was Chlorr'yannah who saw it, the thing that billowed into being before her eyes. It was the eyes that set it apart from the blurry backdrop, however. They were pure red, slanted shards of energy on the growing body of a many-legged, gangly creature.

She recoiled, felt her heel catch on one of the many treacherous craters on the high arch that was their island, and fell into the howling void below.

The others saw her, but Crosaad was closest and rushed to the edge, teetering for a moment on the edge. Chlor'yannah saw his eyes mist for a moment, his yaw slacken, and his arms loose certain degrees of economy as he watched her falling, literally in slow motion. An invisible tendril of understanding seemed to connect them for a moment, and all that remained was a choice.

She felt a hand enclose hers, and looked down to find that he had in that time bridged the distance between them, whether magically or through a quality of the plane they occupied she did not know. Crosaad was lying now with his whole body to the rough rock, trusting to the integrity of his arm and the strength of her grip rather than his own muscles to hold her until Roaki could reach them.

He, too, dropped to his belly and extended his gnarled, furry claw, and clamped down upon the priestess's arm with ease, pulling her upward in no more than a second.

Chlorr'yannah did not rise with dignity, but clutched at the ground, seeming to desire something solid on which to rely.

Crosaad could only cock an eyebrow in response to this uncharacteristic gesture before Chlorr'yannah regained her composure, stood, and gave Crosaad the poisonous look barely distinguishable through the distortions as the one he associated with a desire to whip him to the bone.

The door opened behind her and she turned abruptly, stepping through into what seemed to be blinding light.

Crosaad looked back to the others. Solun shrugged and sidled past him into the world beyond.

As they immerged they were blinded by white light, even with the wards Crosaad cast a moment later. The glare was torture, forcing them all to squint. Their retinas burned but they could make out the upright form that was Chlorr'yanah, and Crosaad approached, leaving Kishtoni shuffling shyly in what seemed to be some sort of cold powder at their feet as the interplanar door closed.

"We must proceed on foot," she proclaimed, barely achieving her customarily imperious tone. "We are within ten miles of their last known position. The shadow plane has served its purpose."

Crosaad stared at her. The last time they had employed the use of Fierlol's ring of planar travel, they had traversed a greater distance than this. He knew enough to be aware that rings did not run out of power. As long as the caster of the dweomer, Fierlol, was alive, the ring would work as it had when it was first made.

"Why?"

Crosaad and Chlorr'yannah both cast Solun warning looks as he took a lazy stance in the flat, cold powder.

"We could be upon our enemy within a day and have them, then be done with the surface realm," he stated logically as he faced Chlorr'yannah, quite aware that she outweighed and outmatched him by a considerable margin. "Why must we traipse these cold lands for miles simply because of your arbitrary assertions?"

As the snake whip came out and Solun was struck down, he lay on the ground, coughing in an almost resigned way.

"Forgive me if I do not confide every aspect of my plan to you, male," she said contemptuously. But as she turned from Solun, who was still breathing through his teeth, Crosaad noticed a bead of sweat run from her temple and down to her ear. "We shall proceed on foot."

Solun got up and rubbed his left arm bitterly, still smarting from the venom.

They began to walk without another word.

Ten feet on, Solun caught up with Kishtoni, who looked at him and grimaced. _Nothing could be helped. _

Solun disagreed privately, and widened his eyes and raised his right eyebrow. _I was just saying…_

Kishtoni cast him a warning look, letting a sparse fringe of her short black hair swing to hide her face. _Let's talk about this later. In private. _

He shrugged and bobbed his head slightly. _Fair enough_.

It was some minutes before his vision resolved enough to do more than differentiate the shapes of his dark companions. He saw the plants on either side, with their stunted white trunks and branching growths, and the path before him came into greater resolve. He now realized that he was not on an open plateau, but a dense forest, and it was simply a matter of luck and Chlorr'yannah's navigation that he had not hit a single tree. His eyes still stung and he was forced to squint, but he was able to gain a fuller understanding of his surroundings. They walked for hours, and he felt numbness creep into the tips of his unprotected fingers in the unfamiliar cold. A branch scraped against the snake wound and he tried to frown in pain, but his face had become stiff and slow. He spent the next few minutes performing repetitive exercises to create warmth in the frustratingly sluggish muscles.

The others stayed constantly on the alert, pointed ears stinging on the sides of their heads as they tried to detect the smallest noises, an anomalous movement, that might suggest the presence of other humanoids. Their eyes, meanwhile, scanned the ground for any trace of a footprint or discarded charcoal that had not been obliterated by the white powder or scurrying animals.

After what Solun felt sure was a full two miles of walking, they were brought to a halt by Chlorr'yannah, who stuck out a hand to block Crosaad. The ripple effect of this motion took a few seconds to bring the group to a full stop, but when they looked ahead inquiringly to see what was the matter, they saw what she did.

Up ahead, the trees ended. They could all tell this by the intensity of the light that permeated the air beyond. And a ways to their right stood a squat, muted brown structure. The ends of the stripped logs that made up the walls stuck out at right angles, betraying a rough look, and there was one window set into the side beside a small door.

Kishtoni approached first on silent, light feet that left barely an impression. As she walked, she bent and strung her bow, passed it to her right hand, and fitted an arrow into the fingers of that hand for a quick draw. Solun and Crosaad came next, and then the other two, Chlorr'yannah giving the bugbear a sharp slap on the back of the furry head when one of his steps made a dull, low thump in the white powder.

The frost layering most of the door had been disturbed recently, for they could see where the latch had lifted free of its hook and broken away chips of the stuff, and the outline of the door was also highlighted by a jagged surface.

_A humanoid has been here,_ Kishtoni signalled in the drow hand code, unnecessarily. They all knew the implications, that there might, even now, be humans and elves within. It was useless to attempt to investigate with infravision, because the frost presented a black barrier of cold that prohibited any attempts search the room beyond.

Roaki slid his falchion from his belt and held it with both hands. The rest followed suit, Chlorr'yannah with her mace, Solun with his longsword, and Crosaad with his whip. Ignoring Chlorr'yannah, the wizard signalled simply towards the door. _Move in._

Kishtoni lifted the latch and pushed inward, letting the door swing forward and knocking an arrow as she peered into the darkness. It was hard, because after acclimatizing enough to see blearily through the glare of the snow, the darkness appeared as a purplish hole in her acute vision. That coupled with the spell of shading rendered her and the others almost completely blind.

Chlorr'yannah, noticing this, removed the barriers, and the inside of the cabin was revealed more fully to the whole group.

To the left they saw a small, lumpy bed. A dark stain blotted much of its surface. Moving forward, Kishtoni noticed a stout desk with a smattering of papers. Finally, to her right, in the far corner a tiny woodstove squatted on rough claws, and beside it a thick coat and a depleted quiver and bow hung from long branching antlers nailed to the wooden wall.

She released the tension on her bow and kicked the door inward in disappointment.

"There's no one here," she said, again unnecessarily.

Crosaad could understand her anger completely, but could not help but feel unsurprised. It looked as though this forest was scene of many hunting enterprises, and was bound to have huts set at intervals along its roads, and, indeed, recently lived-in ones like this.

Chlorr'yannah strolled in and gave the single-room building a short, cursory look, seemingly unaffected by the disappointment. "We must move on," she said blandly, and turned to exit the hut.

Solun forestalled her, however. "Wait." He was staring curiously at the writing desk.

The others followed his gaze and found a single piece of paper. Chlorr'yannah stepped forward to the desk and bent to read.

"Can you make out the script?" Solun said, rather loudly for the situation.

The priestess turned sharply. "I can," she said curtly, almost grudgingly.

_The fifth tenday_

_I stalked a thirty-pointer today for three miles, but it got wind of my scent and dashed off. I can't say I'm surprised. This hasn't been the most lucrative trip. A curious thing happened as I walked back to the lodge. I heard things. Something was following me, but when I turned around, nothing was there. This forest is driving me madder every day, but what did I ever do to it? Well, at least I have a few kills in the bag for my journey back home. _

_The Seventh tenday_

_Cold. I've never felt such temperatures in the Lurkwood. I went out to get that deer again, but the air nearly froze in my lungs. In the end I half-crawled back to the lodge and wrapped my self up in my blankets. Starting the fire was a chore but I did it. I guess I'll get my last catch tomorrow when it's better weather. _

_I keep thinking about my brother, loosing him to the goblins all those years ago. There are things that I should have said, should have done. It was my fault that he died, see? Because I couldn't find the guts to go get my knife and help, help him as he was being hacked down, bitten, scratched. I should have told him I'm going insane. I can't feel my legs, and this knife is starting to look pretty friendly. I can't escape this damned place, but I need to go home, because this forest is trying to kill me. _

_Escaped, but still bleeding from this fucking bite! I need to dress it, but I don't want to risk my clothes. Hopefully I'll find some dressings on one of the huts along the road. I think it's still following me, but I need to write this down. I need to remember. _

_Found a hut. Got bandages. Cold… really cold. I've got my bed to keep warm, but ever since I pissed in it it's been frozen. _

_I can't feel my feet, nor can I move them. They'll have to go. I fear these will be my final words before I die, or succumb to some other evil fate, so here they are: turn back. Go the way you came and escape. Don't go down the same path as Kyle Tanner went. _

_I need to get out. I need to escape the whispers. I need to go where they can't find me! _

The document ended and Chlorr'yannah swallowed. Slowly, she stepped away from the desk and bent low to the floor, eyes scanning. The discolouration was faint and blurred due to the infernal light, but she could see something. Stretching her finger forward, she scraped a large quantity of the mess that spread across the pine boards, and brought it back to see a deep, congealed burgundy.

Solun seemed to have put two and two together as well, for he whirled about, soles sticking to the dark floor, to squint into the powdery whiteness just beyond the threshold. He pointed after several seconds of contemplations, and they all saw it. Deep, bloody tracks leading away from the hut and into the woods.

Kasia was shivering, her nose dripping and her forehead burning. She was relieved by the feeling of a soft mattress under her body, and when she opened her eyes, she was surrounded by the wooden building in which they had taken refuge the previous night, much to their delight. She had tried valiantly to make one of the others take the bed in stead of her when they were deciding sleeping arrangements, but they all unanimously refused to let her sleep on the floorboards.

Kasia looked at the shapes of their sleeping bodies and felt a tear leak from the corner of her right eye and creep across the bridge of her nose where it shimmered in the periphery of her sight. She explored further with her eyes and saw that a quartet of golden motes blazed through the panes of the small window and crowned Phauran's hair, almost as brilliant as the light which graced it. They would have to wake up soon.

She wiped her nose with the back of her arm and drew the fur blanket tightly around her, then sat up and dangled her bare feet over the floor. As soon as they touched she felt shock spring up through her ankles and hissed sharply. But she grimaced, and placed her weight on them ignoring the numbness that assailed them. Soon the nerves acclimatized and Kasia stepped over and between her sleeping friends. They did little but shift and groan. Grummin snored deafeningly as usual.

Across the hut was a small door, no more than five feet tall, which led to a tiny enclosure off the main room. This was lined tar and cedar to protect the smell of the skinned carcass that hung there from escaping and attracting the creatures of the Lurkwood. Kasia opened the door and smelled a fresh, coppery smell before experiencing an uncomfortable blast of chill forest air. She selected a long, razor-edged knife that reposed on a miniscule table just inside the door, cut the ends of a particularly hearty-looking piece of flank from the skinned mule-deer, and then retreated gratefully back into the hut. She slapped this juicy parcel into a cast-iron pan from Grummin's pack and set about making a fire. Within minutes she had set alight a cutting of bark and fed in several logs to keep it going, and she could see Grummin's nostrils dilating, taking in the smell of sizzling meat. It was mostly because of the dwarf's efforts that they had this meat. The first thing he had done after dumping his pack into the corner was to drag Phauran off hunting, and they had come back a few hours later with the animal over Grummin's shoulder, dragging slightly due to his diminutive height and heavily endowed with a tangle of antlers.

Everybody began to wake up as Kasia crumbled a few dried chillies, again of Grummin's own stock, into the fresh cut, and propped themselves on their elbows or else stretched in the now cozy heat.

"Kasia," mumbled Kharyssa slowly, "you're awake."

Kasia smiled and manipulated the steak absently with the end of a wooden spoon. "I hope you're hungry," she said lightly.

Kharyssa sat up a little straighter. "Starving," she admitted ravenously.

Kasia checked the colour of the meat with a small knife, then portioned off two pieces, leaving enough for Grummin and Phauran. The deer tasted delicious after the lacklustre diet of the past few weeks, and with the spices that Grummin—ever the thinker—had brought along, it was nothing short of a delicacy. They tore hungrily at the meat for a minute or so, and none-too-daintily, given the lack of forks. They were no longer much bothered with such customs. Just like the customary morning greetings, they didn't need to impress anyone, and only needed to survive.

Kasia reflected somewhat regretfully that she didn't really know Kharyssa. All of them were mysterious to her, as were their motives for rescuing her nearly a year ago, but Kharyssa had been the most distant. All that she knew was that she was a very accomplished rogue and thief and a survivor, jaded by her long years and some indiscernible event in her past. Kasia would not dare ask, but she had a nagging curiosity for the woman who had been the least enthusiastic for her companionship.

The other two had stirred again, this time opening their eyes and rolling their shoulders, by the time Kharyssa and Kasia had finished, and were now pulling on boots and reaching blearily for the ready plates of deer.

The two women got up and left them too it, Kasia pulling her pack from under her bed, and Kharyssa rolling up her sleeping furs. They each underwent a quick change within the confines of the single room, and then Kasia donned her fleece-lined coat and quiver with the idea of going outside for a bit of target practice. She walked across the room, past the two still eating, and out the door into a rush of cold. It bit at her hands with particular fervour after the secluded warmth of the hut, but she felt it refresh her face and wake her up far more than the fire inside.

She breathed deeply through her nostrils and drew an arrow, pulling the string tight to her cheek. Everything blurred into a dull, background white flushed with a yellow sunset, except a single knot protruding from a gnarled conifer. A stubble of rough dots surrounded this point and within its centre a single, protuberant stub invited the point of her arrow.

She let fly, and the arrow deflected left and imbedded itself in the trunk, redirected by the solid ridge of bark. She drew again and aimed, again tuning out everything else. This time, it stuck right in the side of the knot, cracking it in the brittle cold. She regarded the effect with satisfaction, noting the power involved with such damage. That arrow would have broken bone and traveled a further two inches, roughly speaking.

Redrawing again, she saw something flit across a patch of shadow to the right of the small tree. She redirected her arrow, frowning over the pale shaft and after the cloud of displaced snow. This time to her left, another darting shape, and she turned on her heal, letting fly and watching the arrow fly harmlessly into another whirl of powdery snowflakes. As she stared, the distance tautened. She took a step backward, but the distance that took her seemed so small that she almost swooned with confusion.

She suddenly noticed that a burning was creeping in on the lobe of her ear, the fingers of her hand, and her nose. Kasia raised her hands to her mouth and nose and exhaled, trying to warm them, but she heard something that made her stop. It was like a long gust of wind rushing over the trees, but there was something far more sibilant, more coherent. It disturbed her deeply.

It sounded again, and all around her, the trees rustled, things rushing around her, scampering, stalking. Several syllables were distinguishable, but still not understandable.

"What are you saying?" she yelled suddenly. There was no reply, but the noises and movements drew to a gradual decrescendo. Then they rose up again, and she spun, trying to focus, then clutched her ears as they stung anew.

The door of the hut banged open, and it was as if the chaos of the trees and the air had been sucked down around her and into a powerful drain at her feet. She looked around to see Phauran's back turned, refastening the latch on the door.

She hastened to right herself, finger-combing her hair and rising into a more dignified stance.

"Kasia." Phauran walked slowly forward, hands clasped before him. He was regarding the tree, as if interested in the arrows now planted in it. "I hope you're well. You were cold last night." When she gave him a questioning look, he smiled and said, "I could hear your teeth chattering." He plucked the arrows from the tree and turned to her, handing them over. Then he glanced over her shoulder and frowned in apparent confusion. "A drastic miss. Or was there a deer?"

Kasia turned around and saw only a dark space cradled in the low-hanging branches of the forest.

"Never mind." She turned around again, but saw that Phauran's gaze was directed at the ground once more, rather shiftily it seemed to Kasia. "I've been thinking, Kasia…well—"

This was most uncharacteristic. In the year that she had known him, Phauran had always been a decisive person. He had conducted himself with poise and economy that was indicative of his elven heritage, and he was far superior to her in knowledge, power, and fighting prowess, and yet here he was, pacing along the road and back again searching for the right words.

"I observed, back in the town of Poisson, that when you touched the crystal ball, you were entranced by its images. I know the nature of that palantir, and it is a most seductive power. You can view any images you wish with that crystal ball, any existing image on any plane. Power like that exerts a strong pull on those who are not educated in the ways of magic." He made another shifty glance her way at this point. "That said, I am willing, if you would like, to teach you those ways."

They stood at the centre of Phauran's confused footprints, eye to eye in surprised silence.

"Me?" Kasia said simply. She was bewildered and stunned. Phauran's knowledge of magic had always been a mysterious concept, and yet here he was, asking her if she would like to learn it. "I…"

"You don't have to," Phauran said quickly. "I would never wish to force you! I just thought, given your interest…"

"No," replied Kasia, taken aback by the steadiness of her voice. "I would like to."

Phauran stopped for a few seconds, smiled, and nodded.

"Tell me one thing, though," Kasia said, her own nerves returning now. "Why me? The others are just as inexperienced."

Phauran's smile broadened even further. "Because now that you know what it feels like, you can't resist learning more."

The door of the hut swung open and Kharyssa and Grummin stepped out, hissing as the cold air touched their skin, the former holding a pack in each hand.

"Come on," ordered Kharyssa, throwing a pack each to Phauran and Kasia. "We've got time to make."

Ecstasy still fogging her brain, Chlorr'yannah let herself fall backward, panting. She could feel Solun between her thighs, not moving, not even breathing heavily. Bastard. He had always had a cheek about him, but this was pure insolence. She looked down at the male and saw that he had his fingers laced behind his white hair, and was staring up at the low canopy of tent sagging beneath a light nocturnal snowfall.

"Time and again I have told you that you exist only to serve your females," Chlorr-yannah commented coldly, though the effect was ruined by the fact that she still panted, "and by extension the Spider Queen."

"And does it serve the Spider Queen to moan and squirm?" he asked blithely.

Chlorr'yannah got up, still straddling him, and scratched him hard across the face. His head jerked to the side, but again he tried not to betray any response. She struck again and again until his face and torso were red raw. He cringed in discomfort as she finally dismounted to lie on her side. "Go," she bade him with a dismissing wave of her hand. And when he crouched to retrieve his boots and clothing from the canvas floor, she barked, "just go!" and he hurried through the flap. She lay there for a few minutes, listening to Crosaad sniggering negligently at Solun's predicament, before she dressed herself in her customary robes with spider sigil and exited the tent. They were standing exactly as she had left them minutes before: travel-ready and cold. Solun was shivering slightly, but clothed. "Shall we continue?" asked Crosaad, sounding mildly bored.

"We continue until we find them," she declared bravely, but, unsurprisingly, it had a fraction of the effect she had intended. As Crosaad slung the shoulder strap of his bag across his body and Kishtoni hefted her quiver, Chlorr'yannah pointed a ringed finger at the small tent, and it instantly warped and was sucked into the dimensional wormhole. They began to walk, and as they did, the priestess removed a small, uniplanar crystal ball from the folds of her robes.

Crosaad pondered the night's events as they strode through the brush and fauna of the overworld. It was common for priestesses to use males as disposable concubines, even accepted for matron mothers to use their sons and brothers in such ways, but the fact that they had had to stop directly on their journey to recover Koral Liernan's crystal ball suggested an insecurity that Crosaad found most untraceable. Indeed, though he had known Chlorr'yannah for some time now, he had always acted as house Do'recranopol's ambassador, and knew more of the affairs of Kaltolat, Do'urden, and Motil than his own, and therefore had very little of Chlorr'yannah's background by which to judge her behaviour. Then he thought of the incident in the shadow plane, of that near-death experience. Maybe, he thought, smirking inwardly, she wanted to experience one last orgasm before her death. Then he looked at Solun, and thought of the minutes that he had left her alone in the tent. Maybe he had wilted too early and left her to her own devices. That seemed like just the thing the commoner would do. Crosaad almost laughed out loud at this thought, and turned his face away from the rest of the group.

Chlorr'yannah squeezed the crystal ball in frustration. The image would not resolve, no matter how hard she focused. She supposed that the elf wizard was at the root of it, but then though of Liernan's orb, and how many protective enchantments must adorn its portents.

"We must find another way to track them," she said grudgingly to the group at large. They knew perfectly well that the surface-dwellers were fleeing north from their long-term observations, but they also wished to catch them before they encountered the open tundra, and for that, they needed to triangulate their position more exactly. "Could the bugbear pick up their scent?"

"Not without some object they have touched or a place they've been for sure," supplied Solun. "It looks like we'll have to do this the long way."

Chlorr'yannah shrugged and waved her hand, which clearly meant 'well, what are you waiting for?'.

Solun and Kishtoni nodded, each going their own direction: east and west. For hours they zigzagged in front of the other three, progressing slowly forward, as usual painfully on the alert for the slightest suggestion of movement, a footprint or heat anomaly, occasionally hacking at the tree branches. This went monotonously on until Kishtoni stopped, and listened. On the very tip of her western patrol, she could hear movement. Something was crashing through the underbrush. She looked left and saw a low bush of frosted boysenberries in which she hid silently. It was far away, she could tell, more than fifty metres. She peeked over the white-coated fringe of the bush into the soothing darkness and stared out. It was all a haze of cool blue, the trees showing only as black irregularities against the frosty background, but the only thing that moved in the distance were the disturbances of the blackness, occasionally turning purple from the momentary excitement. This thing, whatever it was, was invisible. Then she shifted with some difficulty into light vision. It took some time for her to acclimatize to the moonlight spilling in through the leaves and needles of the winter trees, but when she did, she began to make out details, like the texture of the moonlit bark and the dark colour of the boysenberries. The moonlight was now white and the snow silver, and she began to enjoy the sparkling mist playing about the roots and brave snowblossoms. But then, something quite different supplanted the mild feeling that had begun to quicken her pulse. The sparkles disappeared and the light became sharper and more obtrusive, as if it might attack. A shape flashed beneath one such sharp beam, a hunchbacked glimpse of fur and tangled clothes, and the leaves shuddered.

Whispered.

Kishtoni felt the coldness, forgot her bow and ran. She gasped at the cold air, pushing aside the stunted branches and needles despite the cuts to her wrists and hands, even let out a sob as she burst through one formidable sapling, and kept running.

Kasia whipped around, eyes sharp. The others kept on walking, not noticing the disturbance, but Kasia heard it from a long way off. It was an animal, or something like. She was sure it was the whispers back again, back to antagonize her with their tantalizing hints. But it sounded more substantial. It was more real than the creatures that flitted in the shadows. Her curiosity overwhelmed her fear.

Kasia looked over her shoulder and saw Phauran, the bat-familiar Ixpie now riding on his shoulder, Kharyssa, and Grummin all hiking steadily away. She would follow the tracks.

The sound of breaking twigs was getting closer, but growing gradually slower. They finally stopped, what Kasia guessed to be about five metres away, and she stopped too and listened, slowly reaching for her bow. But as the fletching touched the string, she felt it again, the cold.

Kishtoni crouched frozen, completely hidden from the human, arrow still pulled to her cheek. She could not move, and felt fear such as she had never felt in her life. Tears rolled down her cheeks and froze on her skin. She had never allowed herself to cry before, but she now could not stop as the rushing filled her ears. Kishtoni wished that she could run from her hiding place and hold the human and take comfort in the knowledge that there was someone else who was as scared as she was. She wished more than ever that she was not a drow. That she was not even alive.

They looked down at the tree, yet another, which was dark with dried blood. At its base lay a body, sprawled and lifeless. Kharyssa knelt to examine it, sheathing her daggers as she did so. Upon placing her fingers on his forehead and pushing his head back, she could see that he was a handsome man, or would have been, were it not for the shadows that darkened his already black, wide eyes. She turned the head and saw runnels of blood streaking from the canals of his ears, and, upon peering in, Kharyssa noted that sundered flesh lay frozen in the ruined holes. She frowned at this discovery, but explored the rest of the body. His shoulder bore an unmistakeably bite-shaped wound, again with more blood, and tracing the stains down his corpse, she found they led to a sodden mass of fabric clutched in the stiff hand of the dead man.

"Why would you tear off the bandages?" she murmured to no one in particular, looking over the rest of the body and seeing a dagger tipped with a drop of red resting in his other hand, "and deafen yourself?"

"It was a suicide, then?" asked Grummin uneasily, hefting his masterwork axe and shifting his sturdy feet out of nerves. "Was he insane?"

His question went unanswered as Ixpie fluttered across to the man's shoulder. "These were human teeth," he commented, more in fascination than shock or disgust. "But there were some missing."

"Seems that they were both insane," Kharyssa observed lightly, and took the dagger, a fine jewelled piece, and sheathed it deftly beneath her belt.

They stood in silence for a few moments, pondering the problem, before Phauran posed the strangest observation of them all. "Perhaps the insanity was passed on." Nobody spoke. "What do you think, Kasia?"

All of them looking over their shoulders for the first time, breaking eye contact with the frosted cadaver, they realized that Kasia was no longer with them. The trees were not so thick in this part of the forest—indeed, they could see for several feet before the obstruction of the branches—but Kasia was nowhere to be seen.

Wondering what could have befallen her and why they had not noticed her absence before, Phauran got up fully and led the way, brushing aside branches and kicking snow as he slipped through the trees.

After breaking through a thick copse he immerged into a small break in the trees, and on the clear patch of ground was Kasia. Her eyes were wide with fear and she had her knees curled up to her chin. Tears dripped across her face and dotted the snow by her head and she was shivering violently, and, by the look of the ground around her, she had stumbled and thrashed for all of the few minutes they had spent examining the body.

Phauran rushed forward and knelt, despite the cold biting at his knees. He pulled her into a sitting position, rummaged in his pack, and procured a heavy fur which he threw around her and pulled. As he vigorously rubbed her back and shoulders, he looked in her eyes and demanded, "What happened to you, Kasia?"

She didn't answer, but looked directly into his eyes. Hers were no longer wide, but she stared from beneath her eyebrows and bored into his mind, in spite of her shivering. Phauran stopped his rubbing for a moment, shocked. "Kasia?"

"Look at her, she's freezing!" Grummin said loudly. "Leave the girl alone, Phauran!"

"It is not only the cold that ails her," snapped Phauran, sending Grummin back on his heels.

"Now you listen here—"

"Kasia, what did you see? Was there anything in the trees, anything there when I spoke to you by the cottage? Answer me!"

It was frightening. The other two watched as Phauran shook Kasia by the shoulders, trying to get an answer out of her. All the while, a rush of sound assaulted his elven ears and he shut his eyes hard, muttering a spell of concentration.

"Kasia…" the wind stopped. It was dead quiet but for something in the distance, a creapy, sinister, howling whisper that seemed to be growing fainter and fainter. "No."

"Damnit, Phauran, what is it?" Kharyssa shouted, but it was pointless.

Phauran rose to his feet with Kasia cradled in his arms, looking fearfully over his shoulder. "We must make haste," Phauran said. "The Bluerock Lodge is not a day's march from here, but if it is too late even that might not be our refuge."

"What…?"

Phauran had set off running through the trees, and the others had no choice but to follow, pounding through the trees into the unknown, fleeing from the faceless fear.

They had tracked Kishtoni to this location after nearly five minutes of following her light tracks amongst the jumble of animal prints and drifts of snow. Crosaad was busy force-feeding her a phial of some mysterious stimulant. As the small elf stiffened she dug her heels into the ground, scraping canals of dirt and permafrost as her legs straightened, and Chlorr'yannah and Solun closed in.

"What was it? Did you find them? Was it the elf?"

O', how her head hurt! "I saw the girl… then it was cold… and whispers…"

"Get up," she ordered triumphantly. "Show us where they went."

They had been jogging for nearly ten hours, never stopping, never eating, never drinking, and most infuriatingly of all, not talking. Grummin longed to know what they were running from, or what was chasing them, but dared not ask, for Phauran might grow angry, so high did his temper seem, and despite his gruffness, Grummin now saw the fiery heritage manifesting itself here and was secretly afraid of the mysterious and alien power that had come over the wizard. Also, he did not know if he wanted to know the thing that inspired such fear in Phauran.

For the past three hours, he had noticed a definite incline in the ground on which they trotted. He had perceived this mostly through his feet and in that it made his lungs burn with fatigue, but now he could see the ground straight ahead, snow and compact dirt rippling with knotted branches. After he began to stumble slightly on every step, he resolved to look down at his feet, lest he begin swerving.

They halted, quite suddenly. Grummin proceeded to bang his head on an extremely solid, very slippery something. Looking up, he saw granite, rising up in front of him to block his progress. But this was strange granite. Though it definitely had a discernable grain and coarseness, it was quite slick. Also it was a very light, cool blue. Looking up still farther, he saw that small shafts of sunlight reflected off its surface and glittered on the trees behind. Ice. This was Bluerock.

There were no trees atop this cliff, so the sun shone freely on the ground. It melted the ground and created runoff, which passed into the shadow of the trees and froze, creating a sheet of ice that covered the rock beneath.

After this obstacle, they had to deviate east; still trotting at a brisk clip, but it was not as long as Grummin had though it would be before the rock merged steeply with the ground.

"More hills!" Grummin cursed, but kept on, not wishing to complain.

They continued on up the rock and through the trees until they emerged into warm sunshine. Here the grass lay partially bare of snow, a light sprinkling adorning the otherwise brown ground all the way up to the lodge. It was a fine building with large windows facing the cliff of ice and a shingled roof, a full three stories high.

However, as they stepped gratefully towards it, they noticed tracks leading away from the double front doors, which hung wide open. They led from the lodge to the forty-foot drop, and they were of a loping, laboured gait.

Phauran lowered Kasia to her feet and then drew his longsword noiselessly. Grummin in turn drew his axe, Kharyssa two of her three daggers, and Kasia—though still shaky—her bow. Her shoulders were hunched to keep the fur in place, but she was still equal to pulling the string and, hopefully, aiming.

They walked, single file, towards the lodge, this time led by Grummin. They approached the door, hesitated for a fraction of a second, then entered swiftly and took in the scene.

_The largest room of the Bluerock lodge held three cedar tables, each with chairs, two sofas by a guttering fire, ten bunks, and much storage space for arrows, daggers, and the usual hunting necessities. It was as luxurious as hunting lodges came, but Kyle Tanner liked it that way. He sat on the edge of his own bunk, honing the bronze tip of his best arrow and relishing in the engrossing task. Others sat by the fire or on their own bunks in the dim light of the fireplace and various oil lamps, or else sleeping or eating. A snow storm raged outside, wind blowing snow against the diamond-paned windows facing the black nothingness somewhere between the trees and the sky, and shingles and boards protesting noisily in the loft. They were all content simply to sit indoors for the night and wait out the storm. Kyle held the tip of the arrow two inches from the ground and let go. It stuck in the wooden planks with hardly a sound, which pleased him greatly. It would pass right through a deer without breaking, and all he would have to do was clean it. _

_He moved on to the next one and drew it continually across the stone in his right hand and for a time that was the only sound apart from the sighing of the lodge and a few grunting snores from overhead. _

_There came a sudden, loud knock on the door. _

_The arrow slipped in Kyle's hand, a hunter and friend named Yorik fell from the bunk above him, and a stranger at the nearest table overturned his plate of mutton. Then everyone was completely silent. The noise came again, more insistent now, hammering on the wood. _

"_Who d'ye reckon that is?" asked another man by the fire, who had now gotten up. "An' why's he out in the middle of a bloody snowstorm?" _

"_Beats me," Yorik said dimly, rubbing his eyes impatiently. "Should we let him in?" _

"'_Course we should!" said the hunter adjacent to the one who had spoken first. "It's way below freezing out there. If we don't let whoever it is in, they'll freeze! Mind you, how he got out so far…" _

_The knock came again. _

"_I dunno, Feldin," commented his counterpart uneasily. _

"_What d'you mean, 'ye don't know'? He's freezin' to death out there! I'm openin' the door." _

_Without further ado, Feldin strode over to the door, grasped the latch, hesitated, and then swung the door open. _

_There was nothing there. _

_Only the black night and howling snow met their eyes, that unfathomable soup. Kyle got up, sucking his cut finger, his curiosity and anxiety definitely piqued. _

"_Right gentlemanly, you are," Feldin said, the wind ruffling his hair. "Now you gone and let 'im think that we won't let him in. Throw us a cloak, will ye? I'm gonna see if I can't head 'im off before he gets too far." _

"_I'm comin' too," said his friend by the fire, setting off into the adjacent room and returning with two thick cloaks. "Ain't no one should be out on his own in that mess. We're off." _

_They stepped out into the night, and the door snapped shut. _

_Kyle's fear of the unknown increased as he waited for the duo to return. When he had heard that knock, he had known that there was something ill-tempered about it. Aggressive, violent. It sounded—he felt so very irrational for thinking it—like it wanted to kill them. Now, seeing the flakes swirl against the glass of the windows, he could not help waiting to hear a distant scream or see a face pressed against that glass. _

_Kyle picked up his diary, intending to distract himself, but before he had even dipped his small quill into the ink pot, the door burst open. _

_Feldin came in first, white faced and gasping for breath. He fell face-first into the lodge, and his friend tripped over him and fell in a similarly undignified position. He then scrambled up, slammed the door shut, shoved his key into to the hole below the latch, and locked it. _

"_What happened?" Kyle was the first to ask as Feldin ran back to the door and braced a chair against the protruding handle. _

"_A thing… a man… attacked us…" They were both hyperventilating, both looking around for anything that was a potential entry point. _

"_Sit down, man, and tell us what happened!" _

_Kyle and Yorik grabbed two chairs and forced the men into them. _

"_What was it that attacked you?" Kyle asked very slowly and clearly. _

"'_e stood like a man, but he was all dress in rags. Didn't have no feet," he described, leaning his elbows on his knees and staring. "I got some scratches, and Keller's got a bite." _

_Keller pulled his collar aside to reveal a bite on his shoulder. _

_After calming down and having a rather heated discussion on what should happen next, they patched up the two, got them into their bunks, and set watches to look out for the creature again. _

_As Kyle slipped under the covers of his own bunk, he found his brain charged with adrenaline and fright. The snow still blinded the windows, and a man as yet unnamed to him stood watch with a bow resting ready across his lap with several arrows. He concentrated on making his brain wind down. There was no use loosing valuable sleep over it. He would need his strength, though the unspecific nature of his need made him feel even more ill at ease. He buried his face in his pillow and tried to think of that feeling and smell. Slowly, the feeling of being in a warm bed to the exclusion of all else washed over his tired body, and he began to drift off to sleep. _

_A dark shape flitted past the window, and he started awake, his heart pounding in his throat. _

_He did not sleep that night, though it was a vague blur. Feldin had a panic attack at one point, and he was spooked again by another knock on the door, but he could not remember details. _

_Kyle woke up the next morning, not aware that he had dozed off. _

_The sun was blinding outside, but snow still drifted obscuringly against the windows. He could see three men with full travel packs and fur-lined clothes tightening buckles, checking equipment, and generally preparing for an expedition. _

_He stepped onto the wooden floor in his bare feet and dragged a hand through his hair. Last night felt like a nightmare, and for a moment, he managed to convince himself that it was so. _

"_We're going to get help in Nadington," said one of the men to Kyle, noticing that he was awake. "Those two need medicine and healers, but they can't survive the journey. We're leaving you and Yorik in charge." _

_They promptly marched out the door and were gone. _

"_Wait!" Kyle was incensed. His panic had risen again. "Are you mad? That thing is still out there." But they were gone. _

_He approached the doors but dared not go out into the forest, for whatever it was was still there. _

"_Don't worry, Kyle," Yorik said soothingly. "They'll get back with supplies, and hopefully a nice-sized search party. All we have to do is hole up and eat into the supplies." _

_Out in the distance, Kyle heard a scream, and soon after, a satisfied howl. It was only one minute later, with a loud bang at the door, that Kyle began demolishing furniture and nailing the doors and windows shut. _

_After three days, all was far from well. Kyle sat upon the one remaining chair in the middle of the lodge, twitching nervously, a bow in one hand, a clutch of arrows in his other hand. His head and heart were constantly burning with fear, and he had only had the presence of mind to write a few words in his journal. And even those were mad scribbles. The doors and windows were covered with the wood salvaged from the room's furniture, the windows with the tabletops, and the doors crisscrossed with chair and table legs. Keller and Feldin lay in top bunks, not talking, occasionally writhing, sweating through their sheets, at the very best. Yorik was over-sharpening his dagger now, not stopping for anything, even to eat. It was light today, the air freezing, even though Kyle had lit fires with the remaining wood by each of the windows and doors to keep the thing outside at bay. There came the occasional pounding on the door, even a rattling window, but nothing other than that happened. _

_Another day passed before Kyle spoke to Yorik. He turned his head, cleared his throat with a disused croaking noise and began to form the words, 'we have to get out of here', but before he had begun to stutter out his fearful plea, he spotted Keller. _

_He was standing, looking quite deranged. His skin was so white that the veins showed beneath the skin. His eyes were bulging, and his mouth was hanging open. In his mouth, his teeth were red and strung with blood and gore, and his hands bore similar signs. Behind him, in the nearest top bunk, blood dripped sluggishly from the sodden sheets. Keller had killed his friend five feet from Kyle. _

_He looked frantically around as Keller stood, regarding him with those popping eyes, not in any rush, and knew that he had made a terrible mistake in barring the windows and doors. _

_Yorik came running from behind with his dagger and stabbed, but Keller didn't move as the blade plunged into his back. He then turned, gripped Yorik by the neck, turned his head sideways, and sank his teeth into his fellow hunter's face. _

_Kyle let loose an arrow but knew it was no good as Keller turned, the shaft protruding from his shoulder blade. The man began to walk, slowly and deliberately towards Kyle as he turned and ran for the door. He rammed his bow in between door and chair leg and pulled. When he felt sure that the bow might give way, the plank creaked away from the door with painful slowness. He abandoned that and simply resorted to scrambling with his hands tugging with all the strength and conviction he possessed. His fingers bled, his breath came in sobs, but one by one the wooden barricades came away. _

_He felt the teeth on his shoulder and yelled, kicking Keller away with his boot and feeling a great chunk of flesh come away. If that was what it took. _

_The final leg came away and Kyle barged through the door, feeling a sudden weakness coming on, and stumbled on through the light snow. He cared not in which direction he ran, only that he got away from this thing that was not a man. _

_He fell forty feet, and lost himself in the forest. _

As they looked at the interior of the lodge, they saw the scattered wood, the stains on the floor, the scorch marks by every opening, the two bodies in the bunks to their left. Kharyssa was the first to venture into the room further. She crossed to one of the bunks—the blankets covering the bodies looked oddly empty and flat—and peeled back the covers, but then recoiled in horror and disgust.

The body was half gone. The torso ended raggedly at the navel, fragments of shattered bone, tissue, and ribbons of clothing hanging from the intact portions. This body had been half eaten and tucked away in this bed for safe keeping. Its face was ravaged, but she could still discern the moaning, horrified look.

The rank smell of rotting bodies permeated the room and made Kasia gag.

Grummin came in next, axe leading, and jumping every time someone trod on broken glass, or a tinder of the overhead loft creaked in that empty, derelict fashion. "What d'ye think is in there?" he asked fearfully, gesturing at a small door in the far corner of the room. It was small and narrow, like the storeroom in the cottage they had recently left, and they guessed that it served the same purpose. "Maybe there's food!"

"Grummin, wait no!"

But the dwarf had bounded forward and opened the door with a sudden eager intensity. There was almost a full second in which they knew something was terribly amiss from his puzzled expression as he stared into the darkness beyond, and then a furious mass of rags and scabbed flesh flung itself at Grummin and sent him stumbling backwards. It clawed at him with filthy, chip-nailed hands, trying to gauge him, but he forced aside the assault with his half-plate greaves.

Kharyssa ran forward to help with her daggers. She slashed once and missed as the fiend twisted out of the way, but stabbed and punched Kyle Tanner's masterwork knife straight through its chest.

As Grummin regained his balance, he hefted his axe and aimed a mighty swipe at Keller. It cut him clean in half, and the two pieces of wasted human rolled to the floor and died soundlessly.

Phauran knelt while the others stood frozen in shock and examined the thing. Its flesh was gray, it bore numerous wounds and sores all over it, and its bare feet were terribly frostbitten and black. It stared with bulging, thoughtless eyes.

He stood up, fear now more evident than ever on his agitated features, and sword in hand. Kasia shivered and let out a whimper as she leaned against the post of the nearest bunk bed. Phauran looked around at them all, turning slowly to the door. "Wendigos," he whispered in final, horrible realization. "We should never have come here. Run!"

Not one of them protested. Grummin slipped his axe beneath his belt and began to sprint, Kharyssa sheathed her daggers and followed suit, and Phauran grabbed Kasia's arm and began to lead her after the others.

But then an awful shriek ripped through the air, through the forest, reaching the ends of the trees, the dark elves, and every living thing within its influence, and they stopped in their tracks.

Kasia freed herself of Phauran's slackened grip and dashed out into the sun outside, which blinded her as she threw off the fur and drew an arrow, circling wildly. But then she heard the whispers undertone the shrill cry, pleading with her, beckoning her, and she dropped her bow and arrow to her sides and joined her voice with the creature's.

Kharyssa, Phauran, and Grummin surrounded her, weapons drawn and eyes searching for any sign of whatever it was.

The wind picked up, kicking the dusty snow into the whirl of stormy opaque. Snow swirled around them in all directions, and then the rotting, dead smell assailed their nostrils once again and the true wendigo stepped out of the folds of the wind. It had the same dead skin, the same dirty hands, but it was more sunken, skeletal, and starved than Keller, and the right half of its face was covered with an ugly, black burn that looked like a huge hole into the Abyss. But worst of all were its feet, for there were no feet. The legs ended in frozen, blackened stumps with protruding chutes of bone stabbing the snow as it lurched towards them. In its blue-glowing eyes was the promise that he would kill them and eat them, and they would taste good to him.

He lunged forward, and in their frozen state, they could not begin to erect any kind of defence against its unnatural speed. It appeared as a grey and black blur in the snow, and shot towards Kharyssa, and she sprawled backwards, crying out in pain as a bite oozed blood. She began to writhe and protest, swinging her daggers uselessly against the wendigo, but the others could not help her.

Kasia let loose an arrow and scored a hit from behind, knocking the fey forward over Kharyssa. But the arrow whizzed straight through , and what was more, the flesh around the wound squirmed like a thousand tiny ants and resealed, leaving barely a scar.

It got up and applied itself to the attack once more, darting between them and scratching and biting.

Ixpie, Phauran, and Grummin grappled with the beast, attempting to fend him off with axe, sword, and claws, but it broke free and launched itself at Kasia instead, who dove out of the way just in time for the footless creature of hunger to fly past her in a wave of snowy air.

Again and again the fiend struck, and again and again they exchanged useless parries and blows, but the wendigo was equal to them. Until Grummin, tired and frustrated from the stalemate, swung his axe with the typical ferocity of his stoic kin, and slashed open the creature's side. It let out another of its disgusting howls and clutched at the streaming wound which would not heal. The cut, which bit halfway through the muscle and sinew of his abdomen, wriggled and attempted to reconnect, but could not.

He let out a great "hah", but stopped as he blocked the thing's gnashing jaws frantically with the shaft of his axe. Its breath smelled like a thousand decaying swamps, and he realized, with another pang of fear, that this smell had been lying just beneath the surface for the entire journey.

As another arrow ripped distally through the wendigo and threw him off the scrambling dwarf, Phauran looked at the burn and remembered the scorch marks back in the lodge, the boarded windows, and he changed tactics to suit a very dangerous idea.

He extended his palm outwards into the obscuring snow, towards the blurred shapes of his friends and the fiend, and yelled the draconic words "Gertonn, hatotha ar pona" _fire on my body_.

A wave of hot energy burst outward, vaporizing the snow around him and sending everyone except the caster off their feet. In the moment of sudden clarity, Phauran was surrounded by a sphere of fire.

The wendigo's eyes went, if possible, even wider as he regarded the ball of fire that was Phauran the wizard, and then he turned walked uncertainly toward it, bearing his teeth.

Phauran charged, and Ixpie, Grummin, Kharyssa and Kasia all scattered.

The wendigo realized that it was too late a moment before it was engulfed. All was a blur of cold flesh and red heat as Phauran struck him to the ground and passed over him.

The creature lay flat on its face, thrashing on the ground, its back and legs smouldering as they tried in vain to heal, and the tiny parasites died with little pops. It planted its hands on the ground, however, and rose to face them, looking even more supernaturally horrid than ever with half its body eaten away.

He went for Grummin again, bites and scratches sliding off the surface of his armour, until the jagged nails connected painfully with the dwarf's face. He shook it off, however, and kicked his assailant away with a growl. As Ixpie soared in and proceeded to puncture the thing's face and neck with claws and tiny teeth, Grummin passed his axe behind himself, building momentum, and landed another monumental blow.

The wendigo lurched sideways onto the ground, and Phauran stepped in, stomping his flaming boot onto the fey creature with striking finality and plunging his longsword down to the hilt.

One last howl, and it moved no more. The snow all around them fell, powdery and harmless to the ground amidst the bloody foot prints and scuffmarks.

The body rose upwards as something immaterial strained at its burning corporeal boundaries. The fey spirit broke free, leaving the body to flop lifeless to the ground, soared into the blue, and, with one last anguished cry, dissolved into the sky and was no more.

They all looked down at the body on the ground and saw a human with a scared, helpless expression on his charred face, almost recognisable as the hunter he had once been, and no longer the creature who had killed Kyle, Yorik, Feldin, and the others and turned Keller to an even worse fate.

Kasia walked forward, a neutral expression on her face, and wrenched her arrow from the stale body. It did not lash out or try to bite, and she did not expect it to.

They all looked around at the forest, now hearing no disturbing whispers.

"Ye should get that looked at," commented Grummin, kneeling down to examine the bite wound on Kharyssa's right arm as she breathed through her teeth.

"What bad fortune," commented Ixpie, out loud. They all stared. Ixpie had never once spoken with her mouth until this point, always incapable of the feat in light of her limited maturity. "I think I no longer wish to sleep at the Bluerock lodge."

_You have grown, my little friend_, imparted Phauran.

_While you have shrunk, my big companion. Never panic like that again. You blocked me out!_

But when Phauran showed the grace to feel ashamed, she crawled into the folds of his robes and out of sight.

Grummin noted that the wound was not deep, and that the wendigo's infection did not seem to be spreading. That is, until he went blind.

As he finished casting his spell, Crosaad watched from the top of his tree with some satisfaction as the dwarf waved his hand confusedly before his eyes. He coiled his legs beneath him, and spread his new bat wings to take flight and join battle as Roaki and Solun sprinted from beneath the ridge below.

Phauran, Kharyssa and Kasia turned, outraged, to see the familiar figures charging, weapons raised in threat, ready to fight. They newly unsheathed their weapons and squared up as best they could while panting and forcing down the various aches and pains of the previous battle, but Kharyssa barely dodged out of the way as Roaki's falchion waved past. She caught the blade on the cross of her left dagger, forced the great weapon over her head, and thrust forward with her other, but Roaki grabbed her wrist with a growl and pulled, sending her stumbling around him as she leaned on his gripping fist.

A female drow that they did not know now immerged from beneath the lip of the ridge, levitating onto the ledge, and Kasia's arrow bounced off as the female waved her arms menacingly.

Kharyssa and Phauran were backing toward the lodge, each duelling with Roaki and Solun, exchanging strikes and ringing off blades so quickly that they could not discern different weapons. When their backs hit solid wood, though, they knew that they were in trouble. A fierce uppercut from Solun cut an excruciating wound across Phauran's body and he slumped sideways into the snow. An arrow pinged off of the lodge where Phauran's gut had once been and fell harmlessly to the ground.

Kishtoni cursed and reloaded with lightning speed. She crouched halfway up the tree from which Crosaad had taken to the air moments before. She fired one arrow, arcing it high and letting it loose some power, at the desperately fighting Kharyssa between Roaki and Solun, who were working flawlessly in tandem. It stuck shallowly between the half-elf's ribs and made her buckle, at which point Roaki missed her with a lethal blow, instead catching her head with the blunt of his blade and knocking her, stunned, to the side. She let loose another one, which passed through Grummin's calf. As the dwarf crumpled, Chlorr'yannah grasped him by the neck and pulled out a wand which bound him in ropes from its tip.

Crosaad felt the elf's body beneath his careless foot as he strode through the tumult, the surface-dwellers falling around him, to where Kasia stood cold, swivelling uselessly on the spot, trying to find a target. She was surrounded.

With a flick of his finger, he sent a wave of ice cold air at the trembling girl and saw her eyes droop, her breath mist, and her knees buckle. She fired an arrow, but it sailed high. Reloaded, and fired at Chlorr'yannah, who deflected it with her chest and continued incarcerating Grummin.

Sissu uncurled from Crosaad's hand and sprang onto Kasia to sink his teeth into her exposed neck. She did not even protest as the poison overtook her and she was paralysed completely.

They were all tied and placed against the side of the lodge in the darkening daylight.

Crosaad crouched to look Phauran in the face, but his eyes were closed. "Where do you keep that crystal ball?" he inquired under his breath, to no reply. He lifted the pack from beside the pale elf and opened it. Not to his surprise, he found that it occupied the bulk of the bag, and he pulled it out. It was immediately snatched from him by Chlorr'yannah, and she held it at eye level, inhaling an empowered breath.

"This artefact holds the power to ensure the rightful destiny of House Do'recranopol, D'A'racraspernion!" she announced to the growing night, and as they hefted the limp bodies of the surface dwellers, Crosaad looking satisfied, Solun unconvinced, Roaki noncommittal, and Kishtoni as downtrodden as ever, they stepped into the shadow plane on the long journey home, the portal closing and the sun sinking in kind below the tops of the haunted trees.


	5. Escaping Do'recranopol

Escaping House Do'recranopol

**Escaping Do'recranopol**

Melee Magthere was and always had been the simplest and least ornamented building on the coveted plateau of Tier Breche. Pyramidal and angular, it had few spires, and its entrances were guarded by the lower students of its violent teachings. It stood forever in the shadow of Arach-Tinilith and Sorcere, the former shaped articulately and unnervingly in the form of an immense spider, boasting the divine and unholy teachings of the Spider Queen and her ghastly disciples, and the latter training the deadly sorcerers of the City of Spiders, an altogether more castle-esque structure with many towers and turrets, all formed and hewn from the stalactite that constituted almost the entire city. In Melee Magthere the students learned the bold art of the many weapons common to the martial teachings of the drow. This was considered by the magic users to be the common art, the skills for the rabble, the leftovers who could not or were not permitted to learn magic. However, this was hardly the case. Where the scholarly work lacked, the gaps were filled by the tutelage of lies and deception that were the foundation of the drow way; the intricacies of merciless strategy and the famous dark lore that drove the young warriors. In short, the youngsters who passed through this part of the academy were as well-honed in the covert practices of intrigue as any in the city. This manifested itself in the swordsmanship itself. The blows aimed for the weakest points, pressing every advantage and not stopping for honour. Each move was a calculation, each mind twenty steps ahead, and each hand ready to spin death at the most opportune moment.

Solun could think of no discipline better suited to the drow way of life and had slid into the fold with ease and sharp eyes. In his first year alone, he had assassinated three classmates, and had avoided the same fate three times to boot. Indeed, he had forged his own sword in secret, having stolen the adamantine required from Master Horuzel Arkesh himself without his ever knowing. And with the practice poles he had struck himself an envied reputation, finishing no less than third in every year's grand melee. This was a long-standing tradition between the school of melee and Sorcere. In the Melee Magthere proper, a huge maze was constructed, different every time, and the students would receive practice polls and choose starting places, even allies, upon whom they would turn when no opposition remained. Solun operated alone. He specialized in finding the most secret hiding holes early on and either taking up his position right away or turfing out the prior occupant. He would lie in wait in a nook and cut down passers by. Once someone was hit, the masters of Sorcere, who presided over the tournament on high balconies, illuminated the face of the victim with a tendril of blue light produced by a specialized wand.

On his very last year of his enrolment in Melee Magthere, a month before he traveled to Sorcere for basic wizarding training, as was customary, Solun crouched on the balls of his feet, sitting comfortably on his heels. He was ready to seal his reputation forever more. Though he was only a commoner, talent did not go unmissed in the Academy, and with many watching, Solun had his final chance to excel. He had hopes that one day he might be adopted by a noble house. It was not unheard of.

A fellow student slunk past on crouched legs, holding a single shaft of shroomwood parallel to the ground. His ears were pricked for the smallest shift of the pebble or rustle of the tunic in the eerie quiet that had seemed to have settled over the stadium and maze now that a significant number of stragglers had been picked off, but Solun's deft footfalls were of equally careful precision. Checking for allies or stalkers behind the lone drow boy, Solun crept forward, readying his longsword.

He struck, once on the throat, and once on each ear to add insult to injury. The boy fell, gargling and wheezing, as the blue light descended, though Solun was sure that he would have been barking death threats and curses of the worst kind in order to give away his position. Solun was quite sure that he had landed this one in something like seventy-fifth place, and therefore quite thankful that he had ruined the boy's voice for the next few months.

But when Solun heard the unmistakable flying swoosh of an air-light _pwiffwi_—a cloak of a noble male—he knew that he was in peril, curses or not.

A blur of blackish shroom assailed him, and he made out two scimitar polls bashing, cutting and diving on his defences with tremendous speed and force. He also saw the face; a long, cunning face. It was Berg'inyon, a Baenre, and a swordsman of great prestige. In the academy, his reputation was surpassed perhaps only by Drizzt, the youngest child of the ninth house of the city, Do'urden.

Solun knew now his folly. He had not checked above, on the tops of the rocks that comprised the maze. It was such a little-tried move and so hazardous that no one bothered to check over head anymore. Surprisingly, it had taken no less than Berg'inyon Baenre to exploit this weak point.

Solun managed to bat the mock blades aside with his sword, turn, and attempt a tripping motion low, which was leapt easily. He had now lost his stance, and had to work his blade furiously, diverting the blows more by the mere frequency of his parries than any planned positions.

He escaped momentarily, staggering backwards and throwing his chest back to avoid a double swipe, but then felt a crushing pain in the area of his sternum. He fell to the ground, and Berg'inyon's boot descended on his ribs once more, knocking the breath out of him. Solun heard his own bones breaking before a fake blade raked his face, and a blue light lingered there. Solun opened his eyes and coughed painfully. He followed the snake of light and saw the one he hated: the pale master, the wizard of Sorcere who had no dark skin. He remembered that face for the rest of his life, and, a hundred years later, he sat a mile away from the spot where he had been put in seventieth place, his old memories reawakened.

Kharyssa was beginning to sweat. She could hear the distant opening and slamming of doors coming nearer, and she had a horrible idea that they were headed her way. She knew better than to strain and writhe, for her wrists were cuffed in irons that hung from a chain which barely allowed her feet to touch the ground. Finally the heavy-set door swung inwards and the tall female drow stepped over the metal threshold. She carried a viciously barbed pike slant-wise so as to fit it through the doors, and wore simple black robe inscribed with the silver outline of a spider. She took one look at Kharyssa, drew back her arm and hurled the pike with admirable force directly at Kharyssa.

It imbedded itself with a sickly thud, and Kharyssa screamed openly, though it tore at her throat after parched and tortured days and nights. Kharyssa and Phauran could remember no more than the attack in the Lurkwood before the darkness of the Underdark. Fleeting images could be recalled through the haze unconsciousness had brought, like purple and red fire and the glow of enchanted stone. Since, they had been questioned only twice, but each memory held a special kind of pain.

"Inariku aspest an on tura." It was a statement, a command, that was plain, but the words were dark, and held no meaning for Kharyssa, unlettered in the ways of the drow and their black speech.

The large female shoved the pike still deeper and twisted savagely, scraping bones and causing irrepressible pain. "_Inariku a—_"

"Maci, anfle orans cro ma raena for, drow, on ar dola ne an inariku olo carfa no'd. Inflod ur neska." _For the sake of whatever gods you worship, drow, we do not hide any scrolls beneath these meagre clothes: stay your weapon!_

Kharyssa gasped for a moment, feeling the tip still in her lung and biting hard with devilish barbs. Sweat and blood dripped profusely, but she had sense enough still to feel amazed. She supposed that Phauran was wise enough not to be afraid of merging the knowledge of the drow culture with his own, but the notion nevertheless disquieted her, just as much as when he had fled from the Wendigo in the Lurkwood or done battle with Crosaad.

"You know the tongue of our people, elf?" the female said more than inquired. She was sneering and still grasping the shaft of the weapon imbedded below Kharyssa's breast. "And the Queen of Spiders, do you know what that is?"

Phauran hesitated, then shook his head.

The female seemed to snicker. "I doubt that very much. She is the goddess we worship, and you will get no mercy from her." She tugged the pike out of Kharyssa, leaving a hole much larger than the tip of the vile weapon. "Your capture was the will of our goddess, as is the finding of the scrolls. You will tell us where they are, and why you were looking for them."

Kharyssa checked her torso with her eyes, feeling that she was in no immediate danger. The flesh was undamaged, but, disturbingly, the plain, faded shirt had a huge tear and was now almost open on the left side. She sighed with relief, but the female, seeing that her spell of illusion had been broken, turned toward her again. She withdrew a bundle of knives, and their blades ignited with redish hellfire.

"I have no other engagements today," she assured, advancing slowly. Phauran was writhing and swinging on his chains beside her, in some fresh new pain, but Kharyssa was focussed on the female. "So you can be sure of my full attention."

From the first stab, Kharyssa was driven mad, and screamed like Phauran until she bled from her mouth too.

Ixpie heard the cries as she crouched in the very corner of the dungeon. There was a plain, jet black column between her and the drow, so she was as good as invisible for now. There were no decorations in this chamber, no figures dancing devilishly across the walls with the tendrils of Yoklol or wings of demons or tempests of other grotesque limbs, but it was made so, to isolate and to betray no weakness to the captives. The carvings were for the priestesses to worship.

There were, however, imperfections; divots in the bases of the walls which had been slowly burrowed out by rats, mice, or whatever sinister vermin lurked the deep places of the dark cavern. Ixpie rather thought that the caretakers of these dungeons had encouraged the little tunnels, thinking to make the place as unpleasant as possible.

They had certainly succeeded. A thin layer of slime lubricated the floor and gave it a greasy sheen for any light to see. At the moment the blurry suggestion of the many fiery daggers was glinting off the slick surface.

Dirty or not, that was her only hope. There was hopefully a network of tunnels, perhaps leading to some manner of escape from this dungeon, and then she would be free to roam as she wished in the city of many bats. How to get to the tunnel was a problem.

But if rats existed in the Underdark, as she suspected, Ixpie could feign the form and behaviour of a rodent passably, and in any case, the female seemed too engrossed in her torturing to pay a scampering creature any heed.

Ixpie puffed her wings from her body in the fashion of a fat black girth and placed her claws as best she could in the places where a quadruped's might be. She then beat them on the floor, making cumbersome headway but accomplishing her goal to the peripheral attentions of the priestess. She made her way along the wall as a rat would do and made the cover of the hole.

Once in it was very difficult to concentrate. With the wings furling and unfurling at her sides as she walked, progress was very constricted, and backing up was almost impossible. She made a valiant effort to keep them closed and use only the forked claws, and that made the going easier.

The tunnel was about one and a half times wider than the bat, and about the same in height, though of course it varied. It was rough, with sharp crevices along its walls where the passage had been scratched out, seemingly made no smoother by the passing of many furry bodies. It twisted and turned inefficiently in any direction it went, and there were many. There were ways extending forward, but also branching off right, left, down, and, most ominously, up. Obviously something other than rats lived in these tunnels. She thought, carefully considering her surroundings and the environs of the interrogation room or dungeon which she had just vacated. She decided that he was underground, and not only within a thick wall. Therefore the most obvious direction in which to proceed was up.

She worked her legs on either side of the tunnel and reached up with her claws, hoisting herself up into the almost vertical shaft and beginning the slow, laborious climb.

She noticed at once that the sides of the tunnel here were far more polished than those below, though thin cracks were etched lengthwise along them. Ixpie thought immediately of long, agile bodies with many legs and smooth shells. She did not relish that prospect but bore the long expanse of the tunnel and continued her search for the micro-anomalies in the many echoes which would indicate the next handhold.

Ixpie suddenly sensed, from the sounds bouncing around the bends of the long tunnel, a blockage further on. But this was a moving mass. It seemed to be swarming forth from the end of the tunnel down into the ground. She made a rough guess that they were insects, but could not be sure and did not care to tarry to find out. She spied a furrow that was mercifully on the low side of a near bend and hared along the final stretch towards it. She barely nestled into the deep crack when a mass of writhing, swarming bodies came stampeding past. Their undersides bore razor-barbed legs in multitudes, and the rest of their lengths—which were considerable—were composed of hard, segmented shells that domed about what Ixpie surmised to be a gooey, vulnerable interior. Her arched back, just shy of the opening in the side of the tunnel, was raked as the legs whipped across, and she cringed. Ixpie could not use echo location for fear of alerting the creatures of her presence, so she had to feel as she tried to find a deeper place in the minute crack.

Without warning, she slipped far deeper than she expected and let out a sharp shriek.

A few of the insects paused on their thundering way, but were bowled over by the tail end of the monstrous tide and the whole lot went tumbling into a pileup farther down the passage.

Ixpie had received an image with that involuntary shriek: a fissure continuing on into obscurity, winding quite more than the larger one behind, but far more constricted. This was so small, that Ixpie could barely fit her whole body into the place. She estimated the size of the centipedes she had just avoided, and decided that those, or something like them, must have made this place. They would fit comfortably in single file, and just as well it seemed an appropriate image; a hard, alien thing worming revoltingly from an unexpected crack in the ground.

And while it seemed their type, Ixpie didn't fancy it one bit. She pushed herself out with her legs, and was just about to re-enter the main thoroughfare when her nose caught something very welcome, and very disturbing. It was fresh air, and it was issuing directly from the fissure below, or rather to the left or right, she surmised, now she had gotten her bearings again. She really did not want to enter that wormhole, and did not want to embark on a path in which she could be so easily bottlenecked. But at the same time, the air was so tantalizing, if it was a bit thin and polluted with the stench of things that burrowed and stole in the dark.

Ixpie's reason overruled her desire and she continued along the main tunnel.

However, as it curved to the right, it did not recover into its usual ascent. In fact, it sloped down slightly. Ixpie stifled a groan. The centipedes would undoubtedly send scouts to find the thing that had screeched, so there was a good chance that a few of them would be patrolling the tunnels. Would Ixpie keep on in the hopes of finding an easier route to the place she needed to go, where she might not find another lucky furrow, or brave the fissure?

She turned around and crawled along the creases and scrapes along the tunnel and around the curve to the tiny opening. She grimaced once, looked up and down the tunnel, and, seeing no discernible signs of a tail, stole into the dark depths of the fissure.

Ixpie was forced to worm her way more than crawl through the space. Each time she contorted her body around an obstacle, the next would be pressed up against her nose. She would manoeuvre her snout around it and send out pings of sound that ricocheted a lot more loudly than in the wider tunnel. Furthermore, she realized she had no room to manoeuvre, and the centipedes, being far slimmer, had far more capacity to pursue and negotiate the awkwardly twisting opening and catch up to her. If one of those creatures was devouring her from behind, she could do nothing about it.

But she had committed herself to the tunnel now, and could not back out now, even if she had wanted to.

She could, however, smell the air getting fresher by the inch, drawing her onward to what qualified as the surface in such cramped conditions.

At last, after three excruciating minutes of crawling, she felt a draught from further up the tunnel. Emboldened, she clawed her way frantically up the last few inches and poked her head out of the crack and into the underground world.

She was in a small cavern, no more than four feet high and twice that deep and wide. It was rough and relatively natural by her estimation. Her head currently protruded out of the side of the cave's wall directly to the right of the opening. As Ixpie crawled free of the miniscule opening and glided onto the middle of the floor, she looked out on the world of the drow for the first time in nigh on a century.

It struck her afresh how very immense the city's cavern really was, and, framed in the jagged mouth of this wide cave, she could not view the pinnacle of Narbundel, the pillar timepiece and crown jewel of the city, until she ventured several more feet forward.

Tier Breche lay beyond the pillar, at the other end of the city, and the myriad of fiery peaks that were the houses and towers of the city blocked it from view, but Ixpie knew it was there.

Thinking that she may as well get this flight over with, Ixpie spread her wings and flapped energetically into the open air.

It was cold and slightly humid, especially as she rose higher and higher, aiming for the spiky rafters of the city's cavern, where bats were common among the uncultivated stalactites which were their homes. The first monumental formation loomed like an inverted mountainside, and she swerved wide to avoid it.

Ixpie only now realized that she could not travel in a straight line through the maze of stalactites. She would have to fly lower, and this would be a blatant admission that she did not know her way, and was not a local. However this had to be risked, for speed was of the essence in this.

She swooped lower, and immediately perceived tails. Smaller, darker bats were keeping within ten feet of Ixpie and well behind, but marking her with precision.

The peaks whizzed past with the speed of her flight. She was anxious to loose these silent followers, but dared not use evasive tactics, for if she were discovered, the whole bat colony would in all likelihood come down on her.

With Tier Breche in sight, she began to descend. The glowing towers and spires looked down upon the city like hooded wraiths, ruling from the pedestal of the plateau and making perfectly clear that trespassers were not tolerated.

But Ixpie was thankfully not a trespasser.

She felt a minute glyph gleam on her underside as she soared down to the twin spider obelisks. They remained inanimate, but she still felt their presence as tendrils of magical surveillance raked her being.

Now no more than fifty feet from the ground, she directed her flight upward again, aiming for a northern tower jutting out from one of the main turrets.

Across the gulf of open air, she perceived a window, an uncovered opening, but with a perceptible barrier wavering on the edge of material existence, and she made for it, noting that she had lost her dour escort.

She alighted on the small, narrow sill and peered into the gloom with a wave of clicks. They were distorted and dampened by the pane of magical protection, but she could still perceive a shape moving beyond the obscurity. Feeling the glyph work its magic again, Ixpie crawled forward and through the magic. It made every hair stand up on her furry body, but she passed unscathed.

She looked upon a small, circular room, in keeping with its exterior, containing many rectangular tables and desks. These held various paraphernalia such as scrying glasses, clawed, black imitations of hands wearing a multitude of rings, and other instruments of magic. However, the walls did not stop where they should have according to the dimensions of the exterior, but stretched into a deep gloom. The whole space was only lit by a single, shaded candle sitting on a desk near the middle. These walls seemed to be made of book shelves, and bristled with heavy volumes, scrolls, and an entire column of glass globes of varying sizes.

A high-backed, narrow chair faced away from the window, but she could detect a silhouette, black and slender, protruding slightly from the sides.

"Were I not so curious to know how you passed the defences of both the Academy and my window, you would already be dead," commented a not entirely unfamiliar voice from behind the chair-back. "For how could you be anything but… ah."

"If you have not noticed the signs before, I shall not deign to enlighten you, O' noble D'a'racraspernionson," Ixpie replied haughtily. "I confess myself offended, though unsurprised." She crept forward, jumped, and alighted on the nearer of the many desks. "Let us say for the present that I am acquainted with your matron's ways. It would have been a stipulation of hers that she and the other nobles be able to pass through all of your study's defences."

"A detailed deduction."

"She is simple-minded," Ixpie snapped without really meaning to, and she heard Crosaad Do'recranopol's smirk, though his back was still turned. "Easy to predict. It was not a gamble, stepping through that window."

"Very well," he said smugly. "As you are clearly nothing more than a trespasser and escapee, I think that it is time to say farewell."

Ixpie stiffened. "I have something you want much more than a catchup with an old colleague," she said sharply, and she could hear Crosaad hold his breath, his silence becoming calculated. "A proposition."

"Indeed?" he said, relaxing slightly. "Speak it."

"You seek a certain series of scrolls," Ixpie began ambiguously.

"You have nothing to offer on that score," Crosaad cut in superiorly. "I could just as easily eliminate you and therefore a hindrance to my finding of the scrolls." He turned his chair around with uncanny swiftness. "That is not the way to bargain for your life, Ixpie."

"You will not only let me live," stated Ixpie boldly, and this set Crosaad back on his heels, if only out of surprise, "when you have heard me out. That crystal ball you have, it cannot lead you to all of the scrolls." She paused for effect, and it was worth it to see his eyes narrow. "It can scry any place in the world, material and otherwise, it is true, but it cannot see all that is hidden. Koral Liernan was no god, she could not complete an all-seeing orb. She tried, certainly, but she never had that power."

"You mistake me; I care nothing for the scrolls," said Crosaad, becoming suddenly and unexpectedly dismissive. "I wish only to finish what I started with your master."

"I wonder if you know precisely what that entails."

"I do."

"Then you should also know that I am an absolute authority on just how much you have to gain by letting me live," she concluded.

She could see him reaching a hundred years into the past, eyes clouding for the briefest of instants. Then they gleamed red. "Go on."

"You don't know what the scrolls are, do you?" she asked, now anticipating the answer.

"No," he replied cautiously. He was interested now, and made no attempt to hide it. But Ixpie did not breathe out yet.

"Well I do. And I think your matron does too, for there are signs."

"Such as?" he prompted, keeping cool, but still urging. He was leaning forward slightly.

"Sending you, instead of her daughters. These scrolls are sensitive to her goddess and her handmaidens, so she would not have wanted to impeach any of them. A sorcerer, a shamed female, and a commoner are much further beneath the notice of the Spider Queen than the priestesses, and are thus much less likely to be tracked. However, she did have the nerve to send a priestess on the manhunt for Koral Liernan's crystal ball in the Lurkwood." She crept forward, to the very edge of the desk, which was directly adjacent to the table over which Crosaad now leaned, his fingers interlaced on its surface. "And do you not wonder why you linger here? Not for the sole purpose of questioning my companions, I think. She is deliberating on whether or not she should allow Chlorr'yannah to supervise you on your next expedition. Though you have proved unreliable, she fears that her movements should be discovered. You are essential to her plan, and thus you have an advantage which you can exploit, with help."

"You wish to help me find the missing scroll," he said expressionlessly, sitting back with a slight thud. His hands were now draped across the arms of his chair. "But we can find the scrolls without help, that is certain. It would take longer, but it could be accomplished, and I certainly have time." He cocked his head, as if reconsidering.

"You don't have time to waste. The sooner you find them all, the less likely it will be to fail."

"And just what makes you so eager for us to succeed?" Crosaad asked, frowning, genuinely curious.

"Because I want Fierlol dead." There was a pause. "That is all I wish."

Crosaad smiled, understanding and satisfaction dawning. "So it is you."

"I can give you much more information that just the whereabouts of the scroll," she pressed, not waiting for him to say more lest the conversation should digress, "and you require more information. The scroll is a token of good will. Find that and you will know that I am sincere."

"But I am surprised that Phauran has taken you in," Crosaad said, seemingly heedless of these words and leaning forward once more. He adopted a conversational manner which did not fool Ixpie. Nevertheless, she needed to gain his trust.

"He doesn't know," Ixpie said, somewhat regretfully. It was true. "All of these years, I have not used the glyph that I created after my…dismissal. I cannot pretend that it has not been pleasant living under his wing, so to speak." She scrutinized Crosaad and watched him think for a full second, then turned to leave.

"The scroll," he called to her retreating back, not moving from his chair. "Where is it?"

"Waterdeep. In the castle ward, there is a cathedral named Spires of Morning. A green lawn marks it, with bronze towers rising into the air and connected by many bridges. The caretakers of this cathedral worship Lathander, the Morning Lord, and so guard their opulent relics staunchly in their god's name. I go; find me when you have the scroll, and then we will talk."

Grummin's beard was sprawled across his chest, his axe was gone, and his poor cloth shirt and breaches were veritably matted with the accumulated grime of days of writhing against the floor and wall of his dark, filthy prison. Dwarf though he was, there was a point at which even he would take another round with a wendigo for a bath. _Perhaps not._

Kasia was not much better off. She was asleep, miraculously, and her head was resting on her exposed bicep, her arms being shackled to the wall like his, and despite her equal layering of dungeon accumulation, she could not help but appear precious and pure in sleep.

They were both heavily bruised, and shallow scratches lay across their bodies, laying bare flayed strips of skin where the cloth was torn. This was the extent of their physical injuries, for the drow had better ways of causing torment. A priestess would administer this punishment, blurring and stretching the perception of every sense and then stabbing or amputating at will. In most instances they would only ask a single question pertaining to their intent in protecting the crystal ball and, on not immediately learning the answer they sought, remove a leg or hand and consequentially drive the victim to madness.

But even worse than the distorted, illusionary pain, Grummin reflected painfully, was watching Kasia in the throes of the spell. Totally unharmed, she would thrash and cower away from the imaginary butcher and then scream and cry after whatever gruesome procedure had transpired in her mind's prison. Only when she had fainted and then reawakened in darkness would the removed part animate, or the stabbed part not appear stiff and taxing. He promised himself that the drows' sundered bodies would not be wicked illusions.

Now, however, for the first time he found that the surety of a few days' rest had impregnated his limbs. He was not precisely refreshed, but now that he came to think of it, it seemed an abnormally long count of hours since the priestess had last stormed in.

Kasia stirred, shuddered, and then shut her eyes very tightly, as if shaking off a headache, which, Grummin thought bitterly, she probably was. She sat for a moment, working the kinks out of her neck, and then looked up at Grummin. "Do you think they'll ever feed us?" she asked sadly, licking dry lips with a subtle tongue.

"I wouldn't take food from these drow ninnies, anyway," Grummin replied in his brusque dwarven way. "More'n likely it's all insects and rats and foul things they serve here. They've certainly got enough of 'em." He looked up at his hands, which were dangling like those of a marionette from manacles, each nailed to the wall by a simple iron nail. It was clear either that the drow didn't consider them of much threat or importance, or that the elves just wanted to hurt Grummin's feelings. Grummin felt weak and exhausted from lack of food and constant torture, but his bleary mind was regaining a grip very slowly. He felt that he would soon have control of his limbs once more, and then he could plan his next course of action.

"Wonder where the elf and Kharyssa are now," voiced Grummin at length, peering up at the dull ceiling and glumly feeling his legs and arms tingle.

"If they are still alive," Kasia amended with equal glumness. She paused. "I'm sorry."

"Don't be, girl," Grummin replied in a tired monotone, looking to the ceiling all the time.

"I am sorry that I succumbed to madness in the Lurkwood, and that I lost the crystal ball in Poisson, and that I tried to seduce you in Luskan. I'm sorry I ever burdened you."

"Stop right there," Grummin growled, silencing her. "Stop that right now. We all failed. We were facing a forest full o' Wendigos and stinkin' drow. You were doin' yer job in the tavern, and durned well, but I came back for ye because I could see that you deserved the chance to escape more than any o' the others in that inn. I knew that danger was all part o' the job when I took you on this trip, and so did you, but you kept up your part o' the venture, and the fightin', and no one could ask more." With that, Grummin stood up, shook his hair and beard out of their tangles, and wrenched the manacles out of the walls. The rusted nails came out of their sockets with grating cracks and clattered to the dirty stone floor.

Kasia regarded him in stunned silence for a few seconds before she could even stutter. "W-what?"

"These pansy drow manacles can't take a dwarf's strength when his mind's clearer n' soup," Grummin declared proudly, dusting off his hands with a clinking of still-attached chains. Grummin looked around, wondering what to do next. Kasia was by far not as strong as him, for he was robust even for a dwarf. His eyes found a cabinet.

He walked to it. It was plain, vaguely grey in the almost complete darkness, with a very thick, wavy grain running vertically along its doors. He made a note to ask Phauran what the drow could possibly use for wood in the Underdark. He pulled the doors to.

And lo, to Grummin's fury and outrage, within hung Kasia's bow and quiver and other paraphernalia, food and all—though it had long been rotted), the heavy, masterful axe Grummin had obtained in the Tor of Hightower, and his assorted gear and supplies.

With many a grumble and a huff, he took the unsecured axe from its hook, gave it a few familiar swings, and strode to Kasia's side.

"Watch yer head," he said grumpily, though not unkindly. Kasia did so, still with a look of slight astonishment, and heard the axe clang twice overhead. The chains attached to the manacles that bound her hands slackened, and she let them fall weakly.

"Come on, girl," Grummin urged a little more gently than before, beginning to assemble his set of halfplate armour as he slipped his axe through the loop in his belt.

He saw Kasia shake her blonde head, grit her teeth as if steeling herself with all of her remaining will, and rise to her feet. She used her hands to steady herself, but otherwise she seemed ready for a fight. Or at least to pull a bowstring.

Grummin grinned slightly through his beard as he pulled the last strap, hefted his pack, and handed Kasia hers.

She grimaced in reply and shouldered her gear, stringing her bow as Grummin crossed the room.

The door was of iron, ribbed and virtually impenetrable, so brute force was ruled out immediately. More than that, any locks more complicated than a stick thrust through the top of a simple latch escaped both Kasia and Grummin, a serious handicap.

Even with their weapons returned to them and their bonds cut, they were still trapped in a nigh-impregnable room, where any moment they might be met with a priestess bent on torturing them. And as if a single priestess wasn't enough trouble, they did not know where they were, though Grummin made a guess at subterranean, judging by the rough walls of worn igneous rock, and they didn't know where to go other than vaguely away, and the whole might of an entire city, or just a tunnel or two in the wilderness, might lie between them and freedom.

Kasia looked at the door, staggered forward to support herself on its frame, shut her eyes tight, and let out a piercing scream. Grummin nodded approvingly as footsteps pattered beyond the solid portal and a rusty mechanism could be heard setting tumblers into motion and causing the door to swing ajar. No sooner had the short drow guard stepped into the dungeon and discovered the ruined remnants of the shackles than Grummin's axe swept the white-haired head from its shoulders. As the vacant body slumped to the ground, Grummin noted the appearance of the guard. Seldom had he gotten a good look at the elves before, so consumed had he been in battle (or blinded, in the case of his last encounter), but now that he looked they seemed all the same to a certain extent. Prominent cheekbones, subtle jaws, and keen eyes all lent to a lithe, almost emaciated look that did not take from the substance of the creature, but rather gave to it a dark, slinking grace that could scarcely be achieved by other races. The eyes were cold in death, and there had not been much more there in life, not even fear as the blade had swung forth from the darkness to claim him.

They stepped over the body, closed the heavy door behind them, and faced an almost pitch black hallway.

Squaring their shoulders, they each took a steadying gulp, and stepped forward into the unknown.

Kishtoni walked along a side passage of the ground level of the stalagmite of house Do'recranopol. The entire complex was in a busy commotion, and commoners and nobles alike flitted past on errands of battle.

Outside, beyond the semi-transparent walls of the compound, the city of spiders was writhing with activity. It was the clashing of small armies in the district of Narbundelyn. A small but cunning force of Duergar, or grey dwarves, had broken through, and were engaged with the small fighting force that could be mustered in the little time it had taken them to slip through the walls of the city.

The Duergar had been imposing their so-called siege on the noble city of spiders for two years now, the result of Triel Baenre's mistakes in the silence of Lolth and the subsequent defeat if the drow armies. The endless raids were a constant presence on the fringes of Menzoberranzan, taking the lives of many unsuspecting patrols and costing the houses many troupes.

But the raids very rarely got this far. This was an especially devoted force, and though the attempt would prove suicidal in the end, it was undoubtedly a nuisance to the population.

Kishtoni was unaccountably nervous. She had been told that the girl and the dwarf had been shut away in the first level beneath the compound in the lowly stone foundations.

She wasn't sure that they would be completely safe in the simple slaves' dungeons, so poor was the maintenance and the attention to security. Most of the prisoners who were sent down there had already been so cowed by their oppressed lot in the drow society that they didn't even bother attempting to escape or resist the crude punishments that were inflicted upon them. These ones were fresh, and had eluded them for more than a month. They didn't seem like the type to simply give up.

Yes, she was going to check if they were safely locked away and cowed. That was why she was striding through the place she hated to its very depths on her own. She cared about that sort of thing.

Nay, she was not sure of her errand, if it had a purpose, what it would change. She saw the tunnel in the precise vivacity of the visible spectrum now, thanks to her relentless practice with shooting, reading and the like. She had rarely ever read before her time with Crosaad, and had only been taught in the early days of her weaning the meanings of symbols and their varied conjunctions. Her ability to comprehend the higher tongues and the complexities of academia was thanks to Crosaad. From the day she was taken in, as a girl of 20 with burden of sorrow beyond her years, by Crosaad, he had secured the house crest for her and instructed her in its invocation. He had then introduced to her his personal library contained within his abode in the academy. Read now, "Shamed," he had said, "and beware, I shall have a digit for every book or scroll you misplace or steal."

Hours a day she had been left to her own devices. Most of the books she didn't understand, but determined she soon found texts translating words of the draconian and high languages to the common speech. Through these, she was able to begin her long assault. She applied herself rigorously to the books and scrolls left to her. Some she found to be nothing more than complicated spell theory, far beyond her reach, but some she found were tales, lore of the gods, of creation, and of wicked deads in the separation from the burning world of the surface, and some were histories of terrible battles and political shifts. The academic way to which these things seemed to be constantly limited did not make for very epic reading, but her spirits soared nonetheless in the apparently hallowed sanctuary of knowledge.

But jealousy never entered her view of the library and the figures it depicted. They were merely comforts, symbols of her one accomplishment. They understood the trials of the weak, though they betrayed no emotion. She felt childish for the notion oftentimes, but what else was she?

Her one certainty in this errand was that she had now felt, or imagined she had felt, that detached sympathy outside of the library, outside of the Underdark, and she wished it back, no matter what it would cost her.

"You shouldn't walk these hallways alone, Kishtoni."

She spun in astonishment, hand on the small dagger on her simple leather belt.

It was Crosaad. He was striding confidently, steps making a noise that she was sure had not been there when she had been lost in thought. She did not curse herself, for the sorcerer had obviously masked all sounds and shadows that would betray him by way of magic, and in her absorption she had not noticed the telltale signs. She buried the indignant anger that, to her alarm, threatened to surge forth. She would not strike Crosaad for marking the footsteps of his charge when she so foolishly stalked the house that was her prison. It was his business, and she also doubted that she had the skill.

"Your back would be skinned if it were found that you had been to see the prisoners alone."

Kishtoni's mind was buzzing, rapidly attempting to fabricate some sort of excuse for being in this place alone that would hide her shameful moment of weakness, when suddenly ahead and around the corner that turned left there was heard a harsh, squelching thud. It was a familiar noise: the noise of rending flesh and vertebra.

Kishtoni and Crosaad hurried onward, saying no more words, and then stopped quickly, for two figures were immerging from the darkness.

Kishtoni immediately slid into the familiar brightness of infravision and she saw a dwarf and a human girl, the first fully clad in halfplate, and the other wearing a ripped tunic and pair of breaches and her arrows and bow.

There was a fleeting moment in which nobody moved. Kasia's heart pounded in her mouth, Kishtoni sighed regretfully, Crosaad glanced calculatingly between the familiar surfacers, and Grummin felt for his axe haft.

Then, in a confused flurry, all went for weapons. Kishtoni, even though her bow had been unstrung, was first, an arrow fit comfortably to the string. Crosaad was next, whip in hand and spell kindling in the remaining one, then Kasia whose bow had been strung before hand, and then Grummin, growling and planting his feet. But before anyone could attack anyone else, a disturbing sound came down to them from up the corridor. A floor-shaking pounding noise, that of more than one pair of considerable size approaching quickly.

The drow seemed to be alarmed to, by Kasia and Grummins' estimations of the drow expressions, and the shoulders of all combatants sagged disappointedly.

"Storm peace?" posed Crosaad with appropriate indifference.

All concerned nodded, and turned their attention to the two Duergar approaching quickly. They were about eight feet tall, thickly muscled, and carrying fitting hammers of grey steel. Their beards and skin were grey and their eyes were lit with red light.

As the brutes came within range, they each suffered a blow from Kasia and Kishtoni. They stumbled and roared, but charged on and were met.

Grummin roared in kind and hewed at the thigh if the first to come within his reach. As the dwarf ducked out of the way of the continuing charge, Crosaad sent a volley of deadly missiles of magic over him to meet the same quarry.

With three burning holes in its chest, a slash along one leg spurting blood onto the untarnished tiles of the floor, and an arrow in the shoulder, the grey dwarf crumpled, and as it did so, it began to shrink back to its four-foot stature. The oversized hammer clattered to the stones, creating a noticeable crack.

The remaining Duergar found time to square up for a sweeping blow aimed for Kishtoni. The lithe drow dodged the obvious swipe and it fell high on the wall. It turned the dark stone and the crystalline strip that was visible above it to glittering chunks.

Kishtoni activated her house crest with a thought and levitated eight feet into the air and pushed away from the menacing grey dwarf.

It instead turned to Crosaad and flailed its deadly hammer his way. Crosaad levitated like Kishtoni and swiped furiously at the dwarf to fend off its enraged attempts at squashing him.

Grummin and Kasia found themselves out of the fight, behind Crosaad and Kishtoni who were obviously occupied. Simultaneously, it seemed, they looked directly at the hole in the wall that Grummin guessed to be about fifteen feet up. Through it showed the dull glitter of fire that adorned the spiky architecture of Menzoberranzan. Checking on the raging fight one more time, they started climbing their way along the rough rock wall to the hole of broken crystal.

Kishtoni fired a well-aimed arrow that pierced the plated belly of the berserking dwarf. It shrank like its dead companion, but was not dead. Releasing its hammer, it drew a small crossbow of wood like that of the cabinet. It shot a poorly-aimed quarrel at Kishtoni in its frustration and confusion which she easily dodged. It clattered off the wall near Grummin's foot. He cringed, but kept on. Kishtoni's eyes followed the shot, however, and she tapped Crosaad's nearby shoulder in warning.

In that moment, Crosaad cast a spell of blindness on the dwarf which was indeed now a dwarf.

Kishtoni and Crosaad turned to see the girl entering the hole, and Grummin hot on her heels, four feet below.

Crosaad dropped a globe of darkness on that vicinity, and they both pushed their way along the wall towards that spot. They entered the darkness

Grummin stopped dead, disoriented. The darkness cleared, and he felt the point of an arrow on his throat. It was Kishtoni. She was about to bark an order to the dwarf in the common tongue when she too felt a sharp point pressed to her throat. Kasia had responded in kind, directing her bow and arrow point blank at Kishtoni's throat in dire warning. Kasia barely had time to smirk before Crosaad pressed a knife to her throat from above. Another collective sigh transpired, but just when all seemed lost for both sides, the confused grey dwarf, either wanting for attention or completely mad with frustration raised his palm aloft and, using the innate magic of his race, cast a bolt of blinding lightning which struck Kishtoni in the shoulder.

Crying out in pain and disappointment, she let her arrow fly wide and careered away.

Grummin, seizing the opportunity, grabbed Crosaad roughly by the ankle and hurled him, spinning, back to the floor of the tunnel.

Kasia grabbed his hand and hoisted him through the hole, and they both ran for their lives.

The two drow got to their feet, and Kishtoni shot the Duergar through the eye, silencing him and laying him on top of his comrade. Purely out of a last reflex, it seemed, from its palm it loosed one last bolt which struck the already damaged ceiling, which gave an ominous rumble, cracked for almost ten feet in all directions, and split, spewing a deluge of large chunks into the tunnel. The drow ran too, until they were out of range of the deadly collapse.

Ixpie crawled out of the hole through which she had previously exited the torture cell, wiping her claw on the floor for the umpteenth time in an attempt to rid that region of the precious juices of a beastly centipede that had challenged her in the tunnels. The fluid had left a fallow and dank feeling upon the skin that she did not relish.

She saw her master and Kharyssa still both held pitiably upright by the wrists by their shackles which were seated in nigh-unbreakable sockets. Their clothes lay in rags, and their nakedness showed puckered wounds purple from their exposure to this foul place. It seemed as though the will to heal them had fled either to dark corners of their minds, inaccessible and hidden, or beyond their reach to cells of the drows' making.

Ixpie fluttered up to Phauran's manacles and studied them. There was no opening for a key and the steel, though plain, was perfectly smooth, even where the halves joined and protruded to accommodate the small hole for the chain. Ixpie touched her good claw to the metal and one wrist fell loose, the loop having cracked at the top and swung down on a previously imperceptible hinge. Ixpie leapt lightly to the next arm, alighted, and repeated the process. As soon as the second manacle broke, Phauran crumpled meekly to the slimy floor with a soft squelch of skin on stone. His long hair a mess all about him began to matte before her eyes, and it was sorry for her to behold.

Next she released Kharyssa and she too stumbled, half aware, and fell. She, however, stirred. The half-elf curled, seeming to convulse with some inner pain, and then clutched one whitened wrist with the other hand. Ixpie took this self-awareness as a good sign.

Phauran's fists were clenched now, and the chords of his armsstood out like so many ropes straining on the sheets of sails. His eyelids were twitching, eyes clearly rolling beneath them. He was in the mockery of dream that near-madness, torture, and some method of meditation had imposed. Where the dark island skin of Kharyssa's wrists had shown white after being bound, Phauran's had been turned a raw red, a thick stripe where it had been worn away and stung.

Ixpie reached forth with the empathic bond she shared with her master and touched his mind. She recoiled thereupon, shocked and burned. A livid fever was upon Phauran's mind and, though his body was relatively inanimate, his mind, having had ample time, was fortified against all incursions.

Regrouping, Ixpie summoned all her force of will and charged. Her attack was beset at once, autonomous bodies seeming to press at her every weakness and exhaust her.

With one final effort, she let loose a blast of mental repulsion with lay the attackers low and revealed a chink of awareness shining through the sheer wall.

She reached for it in desperation and shouted with both mind and voice, "Phauran!"

The wizard stirred, and Ixpie came back to herself. She slumped and her heart beat a painful tattoo against her chest. Her fur was slick with sweat and she was breathing heavily.

He opened his eyes, and then closed them very hard. Then he let loose a wail that echoed sonorously into the darkness.

_Ixpie,_ he said empathically, breathless and trying to regain his composure. He turned over and propped himself up on one knee. _I have been absent. Forgive me. How long is it since I fell into sleep?_

_Nearly a day,_ she replied. _Come, you are free. _

Phauran paused, shaking and unsteady, to consider this development. He flexed his wrists and examined them, flayed as they were.

Then he looked to his left and saw Kharyssa, slowly gaining consciousness. She, like Phauran, shook her head blearily and then, regardless of her nakedness, pushed her knees under her. She turned an astonished eye on Phauran, seeing that he too was liberated from his stinging cuffs.

Phauran looked upwards at the ceiling, from which dangled the manacles, and they were split cleanly on an evenly notched seam. He looked to Ixpie, thinking to ask how she had managed to free them, but then he heard a distant scream and crash echo up from some unseen depth of the compound, pained and shrill, and he remembered where they were. He changed tack.

"Ixpie, do you know how to escape?" he asked calmly, the tremor now almost gone from his voice as he sat upon the ground before the bat.

"Yes, but first you must be clad and armed. I know where this can be done. I cannot, however, get us through the door."

They did not question this either. Kharyssa turned about, rummaged for a moment in the tatters that had once been her travel clothes, and dragged them through her fingers until, with a slight smirk, she found something she was looking for.

She placed her nails among the threads of the seam just below the almost indistinguishable arm and pulled it apart. Out rolled a miniscule phial of slightly greenish liquid and a small set of pins, blunted at the ends.

These she picked up and brought to the door, which was rounded at the corners, and raised slightly from the smooth black floor. She felt its slick surface with her hands, feeling near to every edge, and then searching the middle. Her fingers finally came to rest somewhere around the center of the portal.

She broke the phial with a subtle flicking motion upon the unyielding metal, and it began to sizzle excitedly. When its vapours had finally leapt into the air and seeming nonbeing, there was a small hole, revealed plainly even the darkness, for a sliver of a lighter gloom was visible through it.

Next she inserted her picks. To the marvel, though not abject surprise, of Phauran and Ixpie, the drow lock, once found, was the work of a moment for Kharyssa. It could not be seen clearly the motions she made with her tools, because of both the lack of light and the speed of her hands. The dark was less of a problem for this trio, the elven blood in Kharyssa and Phauran gifting them with their unrivalled sight, and Ixpie being a bat.

There was a last, final click that echoed through the frame of the door and the space of the dungeon or cell of their erstwhile imprisonment.

The door swung inward, and they could see that it was perhaps six inches thick, all of metal, and with three thick bolts that had obviously retracted into the edges of the door when the lock had turned, all set on the left side.

Ixpie fluttered ahead, and Phauran and Kharyssa followed swiftly, pulling the door back into place as they went. Mercifully, it stayed shut.

The walls were entirely black, but rippling with facets as of a huge gem. The floors were utterly smooth, and it was all clean and forbidding. The filth of the cells was evidently for the prisoners only. Feeling suddenly uncomfortable and newly conscious of their lack of clothing, they tried wiping the slime from the insides of their forearms and the shins of their legs as they walked, to no avail.

The passageway was lined on the left for as far as they could see—though that was not very far—with doors of precisely the same shape as the one they had now left behind which were evenly-spaced and austere.

After some hundred feet of blank, repetitive corridor, Ixpie fluttered to a halt. One door conspicuously had more space than the others on either side, and this Ixpie approached cautiously.

"This should be unlocked," she assured Phauran and Kharyssa verbally as they advanced behind her. This one, now that they looked, had a discernible latch protruding from the left side. Phauran lifted this simple handle and pushed. The door swung inward easily and silently.

The inside was filled with a horrendous clutter of objects: in the corner furthest and to the right, there lay a pile of clothes in various states from torn and filthy to whole and clean. Swords, axes, and other unnamed weapons glittered or lay rusting in the left corner, and closer to the left were thrown cudgels, maces, and clubs of the kind orcs and bugbears might use. Other nondescript items lay strewn across this unkempt room, glittering or dull, big or small.

This was clearly a haphazard arrangement, a spare room with not much security and no permanent fixtures for the organization of weapons and clothing, but that was all to the good.

Kharyssa sighed gratefully and ran forward to begin exploring. Phauran followed, moving immediately to the clothing pile. On the top were only tattered orc garments that would not fit either of them, and even deeper they unearthed what looked like dwarven male. They did not dare to spare a thought for this and moved on.

Kharyssa finally came upon a set of breaches and a tunic that looked to have belonged to a female human. They were not too loose and allowed for easy movement.

Phauran spent more time sifting through the many assorted items, finding something thin and close to his size. After a time, however, a symbol leapt out at him; a simple tree, cradling a single star, embroidered upon the back of a dark grey set of leather armour. He knew that symbol. It was that of the Telquorani, a riparian tribe that he had studied for their work on the taming of Pegasi long ago. That they had survived, and that one of their number endured torture or was even now dead was painful.

Though it pained him, he passed on, and instead donned an unadorned set of drow commoner's clothes with similar advantages to Kharyssa's selection.

After not much foraging, they found their own weapons near the top of the pile: Kharyssa her three daggers, and Phauran his longsword. These were all still sheathed and in as close to working order as could be hoped for. Though the scabbards bore some scratches and dents, the blades were pristine and still keen.

Phauran could not, however, find his book. Though he scoured the floor and felt in the corners, rummaged through piles of forgotten things and moved shelves, there was no sign of it.

Now he was beginning to fume. In the pages of that volume lay the summation of his work, and the beginnings of the chronicle of their flight to the north. To loose that was a huge setback. He had even recorded somewhat of Koral Liernan's crystal ball in the latter leaves.

He breathed, and then thought of it no more.

"Let us move on," he said to both Ixpie and Kharyssa, and they exited the room, once again pulling the door carefully shut. With a small click of the latch, it was shut.

They turned.

…To find a group of four drow, fully outfitted for combat: two clerics with robes under ornate breastplates and belts bearing maces, and two fighters with swords and the lithe mail and bracers of the house.

The cleric closest to them cast her mace into the air and shouted a single syllable. It came alive with a blue light and shot towards Phauran as the latter drew his sword. He deflected the impromptu projectile which clattered across the ground and made ready for a second pass.

With a shout, Phauran dashed forward and, as the drow fighter that was his target made to block, he slid the longsword along the length of the drow's sword and sliced lengthwise into the left arm. The smallest finger, along with a considerable sliver of flesh, swung loose and the male fell back, howling in pain.

As the second fighter stepped forward hefting a heavy greatsword, Kharyssa inverted her grip on one dagger. The drow made to stab, but she turned the blade aside and she stepped nimbly past. She then spun and jumped. The cleric who had cast the mace was directly in the path of her wheeling daggers, and the inverted blade came down between her shoulder and neck. However she could not finish the job, because the male had come back, and she had to block with the dagger that was not imbedded. She could feel the heaving cleric reaching out with her hand and Kharyssa pulled her dagger and ducked just in time for a deadly swipe from the greatsword, which took that hand.

The mace clattered to the ground before it could come back at Phauran. He checked two blows from the drow he had cut and, catching the movements of the remaining cleric, stopped a fireball bound for Kharyssa's head. He turned, ducked low, and tripped the fighting male.

"Run!" he called to Kharyssa as the priestess farthest away began further gesticulations.

She obeyed immediately, seeing the danger, and began backing away from the fighter. It was none too soon.

Phauran pulled her roughly towards him by the arm and spoke a frantic word of protection. The air shimmered in a subtle sphere around them and then, by the device of the cleric down the hall, was set aflame. Blistering heat assaulted the entire concourse, and they could barely see the fighter with the mutilated arm as he screamed, whimpered, and died, skin and eyes popping and sizzling. Phauran looked down the hallway and no more words were needed. Trusting to the small wake the shield spell had made in the fire, he and Kharyssa dove and came out the other side of the wall of flame patting small, flickering fires and coughing. As the flames dissipated they were already running, Kharyssa dodging one last crossbow quarrel.

_Phauran_, came the empathic voice of Ixpie, _the last door before the hall turns a corner. Take it._

The doors whirled by and, as Phauran saw the end of their corridor, he caught himself and checked his speed on the latch of that door. It opened without difficulty and he and Kharyssa began dashing down a tightly spiralling staircase, nearly tripping on several occasions, and hearing the slapping of feet behind them in hot pursuit.

Ahead, however, they also heard steps, and in desperation, Phauran cast a sphere, three feet across, of fire that bounced down the stairs. They heard screams amidst the rush of fire as the ball receded into an orange glow ahead. Moments later, they nearly slipped on large patches of black dust.

A bang ahead told them that their escorting fireball had met some more effective resistance than a few drow, and they came to the bottom of the stairs to see the frame of a tall, arched door, whose bottom, unlike the ones they had left behind, came all the way to the floor in a much more pleasing manner. The actual door, they saw as they immerged, lay ten feet away with black markings upon its surface and a trail of broken hinges in its path.

They shifted their focus to where they were. It seemed to be a large hall. The wall opposite spanned something like two hundred feet to their right, the floor sported a pattern of thin blue webs, and all was a faint, translucent green with blue and purple striations. Tables were set out on this floor, with a presiding head table raised on a platform further to the right as they looked down the room's length. The large wall, now to their left, looked to be transparent, for the view of a long expanse of darkness stretched to the edge of sight. Fires of blue, purple, and red flickered and wavered in a sea of spires and low structures. They had very little time to take this in, however, for before them was a group of warlike drow, and beyond them a group of duergar, ten or so strong, had broken through a set of high double doors which bore the spider symbol of all drow.

Phauran looked to his left in their moment of indecision and did not think, did not even wonder if his desperate plan would work.

He sheathed his sword, and Kharyssa, seeing the way of things, did so too with her daggers. He forced her before him as he ran and invoked the spell. The wings of a white bird burst from between his shoulderblades and they jumped.

They burst through the transparent wall, which was like glass, at least from the inside. In freefall, he gripped Kharyssa by the waist, spread his wings, and lead them in a curve up and away from the ground rushing up to meet them.

Phauran flapped hurriedly, trying to keep himself and Kharyssa aloft while adjusting his grip and waiting for arrows to assail them.

Now he saw the city of Spiders in more detail, for this he knew it to be. Directly before them was a cluster of lesser spires, as compared with the rest of the city. Descending from that to their right in long steppes was a shantytown of far more ramshackle structures that started very abruptly where the ornate structures ended, and further to the right than that was an expanse of varied, dark fungal growths on a long lake with an island in its middle. This island seemed to be inhabited by a herd of roving, cattle-like creatures.

Kharyssa, dazzled by the alien spectacle, forgot her nervousness of the height and the precarious grip Phauran had on her and looked in wonder. Phauran made for the slum. Both of them having elf blood, they would be much less noticeable on the margins and in dilapidation where the authorities thought they should be. It was not closer, but Phauran had a bit more confidence now that they were at a safe altitude and could glide.

There was an expanse of rocky wilderness between the house they had left and the slum ahead, dotted with giant mushrooms and stalagmites. It would be far less conspicuous to arrive on foot from there than to alight right in the middle of the district.

Grummin and Kasia looked back as they ran. Both of them experienced a thrill both of intimidation and of awe. A great blue and green wall extended into the dark sky, branching into many facets of smooth stone. A soft, almost living light danced from within and yet did not bestow its rays upon the surrounding terrain of jagged rock. It was a spike, a stalagmite of opal, and they had emerged from its base.

As they gained distance, weaving between the rocks ahead, they noticed that a similar structure resided beside the tower. It was, remarkably, a stalactite, hanging out of the black from what seemed to be a sky lost in darkness. Then, slowly, as they looked more intently, they could discern a spiky, rugged texture that was not that of a sky. There was a roof a mile above them. This must be the city of Menzoberranzan of the legends from long past. For some reason, the fearful recitations of the varied tales did not nearly do the great, terrible city justice.

They both banged into stray stalagmites, and with an effort redistributed their attention.

Grummin and Kasia found themselves walking through a seeming forest of stalagmites and mushrooms. Grummin guessed that they were traveling in a roughly northerly direction.

These natural blemishes on what would otherwise be a plateau were here and there cultivated as dwellings of sorts, windows sometimes glowing with muted lights, or the shadows of feeble figures. These buildings were huts at best, a clear contrast to the gargantuan structure they had just vacated.

As they moved on they saw dark humanoid shapes, some dwarfish and some taller and more slender, the latter being far more silent. Always they darted across their path and sought cover wherever possible.

As they progressed, they saw a high wall of sorts. Through the peaks of the mushrooms and stalagmites, glistening, overlapping strands of thick material stood rigid, rising up twelve feet into the air and terminating in a fringe of jagged burrs. This stretched for some distance in both directions as far as they could see, and some way to their right Grummin glimpsed an irregularity.

He motioned to his right and Kasia spotted the dark hole in this shiny silken fibers.

It was obscured partially by the stalagmite formations, which had again become less cultivated closer to the gate. They clambered through the rocky forest towards the opening, and it was becoming clearer and nearer when they were suddenly out in the open. A road lead out of the half-oval opening and went back the way they had come. It seemed that they had been traveling parallel to it all the time. It was paved with sharp, black and smooth cobblestones and deserted for miles. However, just on the edge of sight, there was a collection of red dots which seemed to be in a commotion of some sort. One by one, the flames, for flames they seemed to be, were extinguished, and there was darkness once more. They looked back to their right and saw the gate, and beyond, through the rigid fibres there were high stone structures, some towering stalagmites, some pillars stretching up into the darkness and some squat fungus patches. Faint blue and purple fire adorned these edifices and licked irregularly up their sides, blurring their mammoth outlines. The structures and streets before them were eerily vacant; they felt they were being lured into a trap.

"Girl, this is our safest bet," Grummin said in barely a whisper. The air was deadly quiet, and only when Grummin's mutter had pierced the gulf of silence did they both notice that the only sounds had been indistinct, sonorous booms and hubbubs from far off in the distant regions of the cavern.

"Grummin, that's a city, or something like it. We'd be swarmed on before we could take two steps in there."

"Nah," he replied, studying the place carefully. "We can't stay in the open. We'd look like fugitives and be picked up by them drow, which are bound to be lookin' for us. In there, we could get an inn or somethin' like it, or else just blend in with the crowd, and I reckon there is a crowd in there. There's nuthin' for't. We'll need to regroup and get a plan to find Phauran and Kharyssa and Ixpie."

Kasia left her thoughts on that score unsaid, and Grummin knew it and held that fear in his heart also. But, bravely, they stepped forward together into the welcoming mouth of the spider.

15


	6. Escaping Menzoberranzan

"Phauran?"

"Yes?"

"What is that language?"

"Draconic. It is a language of great age and power, the secret language of many of the wizards and sorcerers of this world."

The book was small, with a simple, black, hard cover, and the hallowed leaves were stained and frayed from years of toil. The sharp, harsh characters escaped Kasia, though she was literate in the common letters, a skill of which she was mightily proud. The alien script seemed to dominate every page, with only the occasional annotation in common, the language of trade and diplomacy in Faerûn.

"The words have power in themselves?"

"When invoked. It is not difficult to perform magic for some, but it is hard to become a sorcerer or a wizard, or any arcane practitioner. Here is a draconic alphabet, the most common strand; and perhaps the most relatable."

The sounds were difficult, and the range of phonetic variations was diverse, and after some minutes of struggling, Phauran called a halt.

"You can't learn it all in one day," he said with a smile. "It took me three years to become familiar with the alphabets alone."

"It would take me a decade," Kasia responded, half jokingly, half gloomily.

"As it is for most," Phauran assured her. "but under the circumstances, my education was, in a word, accelerated."

"What circumstances?"

"I can't tell you," he said simply, matter-of-factly.

There was silence. The salt air licked their faces and rustled the pages between them, and the nocturnal beauty of the moonlit coast was complete and bore Kasia to a peaceful sleep.

She and Grummin were alone, but that did not give either of them ease as they looked up and down the alleyway. It seemed more like a chasm, for the walls sloped slightly away and stretched into the sky. A constant dull red glare was visible above, the part that was not in shadow.

Feeling a need to rest their legs, they sat against opposite walls, their knees almost meeting in the middle. They had not made it far before seeing someone in the gated district. They had not expected to. They had not caught a sufficient glimpse of the person to glean more than the vague image of a humanoid, but it did not take too much imagination to guess that it was one of the fell drow, of whom they had heard terrible things both in youth and on the road. Not to mention their limited firsthand experience.

"I'm tellin' ye," voiced Grummin under his breath, "I've had about enough of this city and we've been here for about an hour!"

"We need supplies," Kasia said, choosing not to reply. "Look in your pack; see if there is anything left that is not putrid from the days."

Grummin pulled off his pack and began to rummage through and discard chunks of mouldy bread and fruit and meat. Kasia stuck her arm in up to the elbow in hers and felt something that she did not remember ever having put there.

It was hard and slightly rough to the touch. She pulled the object out by the spine and found that she had been right in thinking that it was a book.

It was _the_ book. Phauran's.

Grummin stopped turfing objects from his deflated pack and peered at her curiously. "And what's that?" he inquired, rather sharply, as if not quite recognizing it in the nigh darkness. "I didn't know you carried a… that's never!"

"Shhhh!" Kasia exclaimed, and opened the book in something like wonder.

"Don't do that!" he hissed, looking around as if expecting demons to descend upon them for daring to open the book.

But Kasia was not listening. She had found a familiar spell. It was titled in common, clearly one of the earlier and most basic ones.

It was headed, "A Spell for Autonomous Surveillance".

They both needed sleep, and they needed some means of staying safe during their stay.

She peered at the words for a moment, spikey and exotic, with no allusion to the common speech or its runes. Then, she hesitantly formed the words. They were difficult, especially to Kasia's tired lips, and when she stopped, there was clearly nothing different.

Kasia slumped back and closed the book with a snap. Her head thudded against the wall of black stone.

"I'll take first watch," Grummin said, not without sympathy. He seemed to have realized what she had just tried to do, was perhaps unsurprised the magic had not worked.

Kasia just nodded and spoke no more words, common or otherwise.

As Narbondel's ethereal light rose from the ground once more, Kasia found herself walking the streets on her own. She had insisted on this vehemently, for she surmised, from their encounters with the grey dwarves, that dwarves in general were not well received in Menzoberranyr society.

At first, her strategy had been one of dodging from building to building so as to avoid being seen entirely, but as she did this, she came to realize that she would eventually be caught, and when that happened, she would look very suspicious. She had seen humans and the like walking the streets often enough to surmise that this was not an uncommon occurrence.

However, as a precaution, she drew an arrow, gripped handfuls of hair, and cut them roughly off. It was not pretty, but it was different, and would serve as something of a disguise.

And so Kasia walked on her cautious way, trying not to look too shifty or step too quickly.

The street was wide, and cobbled in glistening black, as seemed the norm in Menzoberranzan, and cultivated with a healthy mix of humans, dark elves, and the odd goblinoid.

This street was particularly thick with pedestrians, and it was not hard to see why. It ran the length of what seemed to be a kind of subterranean bluff. This was dotted with openings that clearly afforded a glimpse of a network of rooms and tunnels that went far deeper. Through one ground-level opening in particular the flow of non-drow seemed thick. Judging by the rambunctious dispositions of the outgoing beings, this was something like a tavern.

This place was not at all in keeping with her idea of the drow city; it was loud, the cliff was craggy and wild, and all of it was generally crude.

However, she was not about to complain: this was precisely what she had been looking for. She had been intimidated by the smooth perfection and cool indifference of the indigenous people, but this rough setting was far more familiar to her. She joined the flow of traffic into the hole in the stone wall and immediately saw a low ceiling and sporadic tables. The room seemed, bizarrely, to end in a series of staircases leading both upwards and down. Minstrels played on a small stone stage to the left, and many were standing. One group of men in particular seemed to be enjoying themselves, all on their feet and huddled around a table. Those sitting at the table appeared to be playing a gambling game of some description, deep in concentration through the tangle of limbs and bodies surrounding them. The mirth, however, seemed of a wicked nature, though Kasia thought grimly that any who would trade or linger here would have to be competitively nasty in order to survive.

As the last of the coins was flipped, the human seated farthest away from Kasia covered his face in dismay, and his counterpart, a swarthy, bow-legged person who looked like he had a streak of goblin in his lineage, leapt up in triumph and promptly drenched his face in ale.

The crowd broke up, a few descending in to fights, no doubt over bets on the outcome of the match.

The man remaining at the table, the loser, was setting a coin on its side and flicking it to make it spin, catching it, and setting it down again, all with a very gloomy expression.

Kasia saw her chance at once, and turned.

The bar equivalent was a crude setup. Three recesses were cut into the stone with large barrels set in them. All along the walls were mugs that were hung on pegs of horn or some-such. Dividing this from the room was a simple bench, low enough to cater to the racial diversity that seemed to exist in this city.

Kasia approached the bar, suddenly conscious of her tattered clothes, but brave nonetheless. A goblin with a pinched, slightly scarred face and a greyish tinge to the normally green, leathery skin traded two barely half-full beers for her four silver pieces. She turned back to the table, still unoccupied but for the disgruntled human.

She approached, detecting his gaze as it swept up and down her body. The ambient noise of this place was considerable, such that barely a word of what she or he said would be heard from more than a few feet away.

She sat down at the small round table and slid a drink to him across the broad threads of its surface. "I know a man in need of a free drink when I see one," she said with, in her opinion, admirable matter-of-factness.

He sipped wordlessly, brooding over the coin, now appearing as a faded sphere in its spin. "I lost everything," he said simply after a few more moments' silent contemplation.

"Doesn't look like it to me," Kasia replied, observing the coin in turn.

He looked up, scowling. "Are you selling, or not?" he snapped. His gaze was unsteady, indicating that this was not his first drink of the night.

"Only if you are," she replied, though sitting back and crossing her legs mischievously. She did not like where this was going, and was determined not to let it get there if she could help it, but this was important.

He looked confused.

"I just need the word on the street," she said, pretending to take a sip of her mug, and blessing the lack of transparency of whatever mysterious material it was made of.

"I would know," he said, "and I do know. Things've been happening, and not all to do with them dwarves." He nodded impressively. "But I would require the safety of my room to divulge my information."

Kasia set down her drink and stood up. "Lead the way."

The man stood, drink in hand, strode around the table, and gripped Kasia, none too gently, by the forearm, to the back of the main room and one of the thin staircases. She saw a dead end ahead, no doubt where it switched back to join with another stair case or else simply to reach the second floor alone.

When they got to the second staircase with no hint at an intersection and then passed into an upper hallway, there was another tavern, filled with more of the same type of people, crude and vulgar, goblins, humans, and mixes.

They turned left, found another staircase on the wall to their left, and took that one, this time a spiral, to the next level. The third floor was a hall lined with doors a bit more than ten feet apart. This probably joined others like it, but she couldn't tell, it was so dark. They walked to the right, and the man opened the third door on their left with a rusty key. They were rough, rectangular doors, very reminiscent of the human preference.

He let go of her and walked around to lock the door, then tore off his tunic immediately to reveal a hairy torso. A hungry, desperate look was in his eye.

Kasia paled. The room was small and simple, with a cot in one corner, a chair and a bedside table in the other, and an ungodly coating of dust. She was back where she had started, a year and a half ago, and there was nothing she could do to stop him because she needed him.

She backed off quickly. The backs of her knees met the edge of the chair and she sat down hard.

"What are you doing?" said the man angrily, stopping halfway through fumbling with his belt clasp. "Don't you back away from me; we had a deal!"

Kasia was trembling now, and only one plan occurred to her, only one possibility of salvation.

She stood up, took a piece of her shirt, and tore it away to reveal her navel and a glimpse of her flat belly. "Tell me something."

He stopped advancing, a gleam returning subtly to his eye. "Alright, we'll play your game." He thought for a moment. "A regiment of high-house commoners marched through this very street not a day ago, scaring everyone away." He stepped closer. Kasia tore away the better part of her left sleeve. "The druergar ransacked seven buildings in this district since the drow reoccupied, and butchered all within." He stepped closer and Kasia tore free another part from her abdomen, fully revealing her stomach. This seemed to incense the drunken man even more and he made to step forward again, but Kasia raised her eyebrows in what she hoped was a warning manner and, thankfully, he stopped. "A two-legged being was seen flying over the city," the man said smugly. He stepped forward, but Kasia did not tear off another piece immediately. She was thinking, hoping.

"On wings?" she asked hopefully. It was the man's turn to raise his eyebrow threateningly, placing his fist in the opposite palm.

Kasia sat down, took off her shoes, and tore away the leg of her faded trousers below the knee. "On wings; gold hair, and holding another humanoid, with dark skin, but not black." Kasia tore off the other leg below the knee.

"Tell me more about that."

"They flew over Eastmyr, this part of the city, and probably ended up in the Braeryn to the East. The authorities never saw it, I thought, because no one else made inquiries."

Kasia's mind raced. There it was. Phauran's Wings of Flying. Of course! And he had described Kharyssa well enough, for the island skin was not common on the mainland and especially not here, or so she could imagine. She had to go and tell Grummin.

She stood up, picked up her shoes and walked forward.

But the man put up a hand to stop her. "I'm not finished yet." He pushed her back into the chair, and this time, he was much closer. "Let's have another one, eh?"

"I have to go. I've done what you've wanted," Kasia stammered. She gripped the sides of the chair very tightly.

He snorted, drew a knife from its scabbard on his belt, and slammed it into the table to his left, and Kasia jumped in shock, eyes downcast. The man then roughly picked her up by her shoulders and pulled her close, an agitated expression on his grey face, which was damp from, she could only assume, the effort of restraint. "I haven't got my money's worth yet missy," he whispered in her ear. "You do what I say or I'll cut you." He was now reaching around to the back of her shirt and fingering the laces that were there. "Now let's have another one."

Kasia stumbled almost blindly into a nearby alleyway. Her hands were shaking violently, her hair a mess. She fell to her knees which splashed in some kind of drainage trough. Her breath came in gasps and tears ran down her face in streams. Before she knew what was happening she began to whimper, her face screwed up tightly and trembling. Her whole body curled up there in that alley and would not move for a time that she did not care to measure.

Grummin's hand was what roused her and brought her mind back from the whirl of memory to the bleak sight of the wall of the building opposite the cliff. She felt the scratch of the threadbare but clean clothes she now wore, looked at the hand on her shoulder, broad and rough, and started, kicking her legs out.

Grummin's expression was one of mixed astonishment and relief. "How did ye get like this, girl?" he asked in bewilderment. She was dressed in a rough tunic and pair of pants that were both too large and ill-proportioned.

"How did you get here?" she inquired in turn with an expression of detached puzzlement. She shook her head dismissively. "I know where they are."

"Who? Phauran and Kharyssa?"

She nodded and got up on her feet.

"What's gotten into ye, Kasia?" said Grummin, still slightly flabbergasted by her suddenly calm attitude.

She bent down and set her pack on the ground in a sudden flurry of activity, drew out the spellbook, flipped through and found what she was looking for: _Message_.

This spell she had seen and heard Phauran use, and she remembered the syllables with more confidence than the _Surveillance_ spell.

She focused her mind to what she approximated to be east. There were many minds, a teeming multitude of consciousnesses, some open and trailing evidences of power and secrets within, some closed and docile. Some were veiled, some strange, and one was eerily, inexplicably familiar. She closed in, and found it welcoming.

It was Phauran, she was sure, though she did not know. Somehow his mind signified for his way of speaking, his mannerisms; methodical but not slow. Purposeful.

_Kasia, I feared the worst,_ came his voice, strong but quiet. He was whispering through the intervening space, not with his mind. Kasia found the sensation very strange.

"As did I," she spoke into the darkness.

_We are in the Braeryn_, _and have secured lodgings. Is Grummin with you? Kharyssa is here. _

"Yes."

_Have you gained your bearings?_ He asked, now sounding prompt and efficient.

"No; we are underground," Kasia replied confusedly.

_Ah, of course,_ Phauran whispered dismissively. _Do you see a great pillar in the distance, lit from within?_

"I have seen it," she said as Grummin's expression turned from puzzlement to mild annoyance.

_That would be slightly south of west, depending on where you are. _

Kasia paused, thinking. "I heard a man say it was 'the Eastmyr'. Does that sound right?" Kasia did not question his knowledge of this cavern. Her mind was far from suspicious thoughts at this moment.

_Then you might not be too far away, gods be praised,_ Phauran responded with some relief. _I know that we are right on the border of the Eastmyr. Our Inn is in the ground. As far as we can tell, there is a drop-off of some sort beyond the guard. Perhaps a cliff?_

It became clear in their continued searches that the Braeryn was the warren of Menzoberranzan, except that the mud was replaced by cold stone. Ramshackle huts were made from rags blowing in a hollow, dead wind like the last breath of the earth upon the hopeless poor. They huddled, sometimes within simple partitions, sometimes bare upon the cavern floor. Though there were stains on the ground, there were few bodies, those visibly diseased or pestilent, or simply lucky enough not to have been devoured for their flesh and hide. There were goblins, some dwarves and humans, many orcs, and even the odd drow, defeated and no longer graceful.

The train of thought lead Phauran to an image of Luskan with all its mud made stone, the many consumed or trapped in the solidified muck, not knowing what to do.

No. It was not worth thinking about.

The gate was about half a mile south of their small inn. From what they could see, there were two stair cases that switched back and forth, weaving in and out of each other along the sheer cliff face. At the top there was a rickety platform, open to the cold air. Creatures of a similar variety gathered there. Those going out presented what seemed to be a crude form of chit to a pair of guards standing at the narrow gate. It was built into a wall that stretched in both directions topped with downward- and upward-facing spikes. A portcullis hung ominously from each gate ready to be dropped. Those incoming seemed not to have to present anything, as they entered at their own risk.

"Kasia," Phauran intoned quietly, "tell Grummin to cover his face with ash, or do something else to make his skin grey."

There was a pause. _What?_

"Just do it," he pressed. He kept a wary eye around him. As Kharyssa was hiding, he was apparently talking to himself. He was draped in rags with a crude hood, sitting cross-legged at the corner made between two lanes between the squat shacks of rubble.

In his peripheral vision Phauran saw a bow-legged goblin with a crumpled-looking face, as though it had been beaten brutally and allowed to heal, misshapen, back to semi-functionality. It approached, eyes blinking blearily, made to walk past, and stumbled across Phauran's outstretched knee.

"Hey," it snarled in a sibilant voice that issued from a broken hole of a mouth. "Watch where you sit, stranger. I'll have you for a bleedin' snack!"

Phauran didn't move.

The goblin turned around to observe him fully. It walked cautiously forward and prodded him with an outstretched foot. Phauran still did not move.

It cast a surreptitious look around it; there seemed to be no one watching. Then it stretched out its gnarled, dirty hands.

In a flash of steel, the hands flew free and it fell back, blood spraying with every attempted breath from a trachea laid bare.

As it moved no more, more goblins and humans sprang from grey obscurity and descended upon the corpse. Phauran did not care to watch, and took care to keep his longsword hidden from plain sight. No one had noticed how the pitiful creature had died; the guards didn't even cock an eye to observe the pathetic squabbles near to Phauran.

At length Kasia and Grummin passed into the Braeryn through the mouth of the incoming gate.

"Where are you?" Kasia did not like this place at all. Beneath the lights and flames of the city of spiders, the low-lying waste was far too familiar. Looking back, she could now see that the city from which they had just escaped was built mainly of pointed stalagmite towers, grouped in triangular sections and stretching out into the distance.

_Look at the corner almost straight ahead from the gate. Keep moving, or you'll aggravate the guards and the customers. _

She did as she was told and walked uncertainly forward. It all looked the same.

_I am clothed in grey rags and sitting beside a sizeable bugbear, _came his calm voice.

"I see you," she responded, and walked in his direction.

_Slow down,_ he cautioned. _Don't move your mouth so much. Start walking down the street on your right; I'll walk with you. You'll be alright. _

A set of light footsteps joined theirs as they passed by the bugbear and Kasia let the spell drop at last. Only now did she realize the pressure it had been exerting on her mind and body alike. She felt suddenly lighter herself.

"Come," Phauran urged, leading her with a gentle hand on her back. "We must turn twice more and head the way we came. We can then enter the inn and rest."

They did so eventually, past the lines of slums and bedraggled inhabitants. They came to a low-rising building at the very lip of the cliff, made haphazardly of stones with square windows and squat doors lining its façade. There also seemed to be a larger set of double doors near the middle of the structure which, Kasia surmised, led deeper into the inn, perhaps to a common room. The cement was crumbling and the windows bore no glass or transparent material of any kind, but it was shelter, and looked far more luxurious next to the impromptu tents on the other side of the sluggish, dejected traffic. Phauran slowed for just a moment, seeming to search for a particular door, and then sped up again having located it, with Grummin and Kasia in tow.

There was no keyhole or latch, just a simple handle carved out of the same strange material as they had seen back in the dungeon. Phauran opened the door to reveal a very small room indeed. The floor was stone, polished by the passing of many feet, and there was no bed; instead there was a flat mattress in the back right corner.

And in the middle of the room sat Kharyssa, sheathing a dagger and rising.

Kasia stifled a panicked gesture. Kharyssa's dark, tropical skin had momentarily put her in mind of the skin of the drow, though the eyes were brown, and the hair black. She looked awkward, but graceful as ever in her unobtrusiveness.

As soon as the door was closed Kasia turned and threw her arms around Phauran. He started for a moment, halfway through pulling off his hood, and then patted her gently on the back, eyes fixed on the wall.

When she had broken away to exchange a glance of greeting with Kharyssa, Grummin walked forward, his beard lifted in a wry smile, clapped his hand upon the elf's elbow, and growled, "Always knew you couldn't die that easily, you old rascal."

Ixpie presently crawled forth to watch the proceedings with beady eyes, though they were not her primary mechanism of sight.

"How did you remember that spell?" inquired Phauran, now looking puzzled after the short-lived merriment.

Kasia now returned to the sombre mood of the past few days. She paled as she looked at Phauran's inquisitive glance. Slowly, she unshouldered her pack, drew it open at the top, and extracted the spellbook. It looked so ordinary in its rigid black coverings, and yet it was altogether sacred. Without looking up, she held it out on a shaking hand, the other balled into a fist at her side. She could feel the nails digging in and focussed on the sting as the book was taken from her hand, slowly at first, and then wrenched away. To her surprise, she heard a snicker of surprised glee, and she looked up. Phauran took her outstretched hand and held it up in the air, as if she had just came top in a race of mind-boggling distance.

"Hah!" he exclaimed, though carefully not too loud. He let the hand fall in limp surprise and flicked through the pages. "I thought I would never see this book again, Kasia. Blessed Kasia; by the gods, you have done well."

He looked up, a gleeful fire in his eyes, but checked slightly as he looked more intently. Her eyes were bright and even as he watched her blank expression crumbled and she succumbed to tears on the spot. She stood, sobs now wracking her shoulders and chest in the ill-fitting clothes. For a moment Phauran wavered, clearly lost for words, then, hesitating no longer, he stretched out his hands to hold her head and pressed it to his own chest. She wrapped her arms gratefully around his middle and continued for many minutes in this manner. Phauran knew, or guessed, the panic and the loss in her heart, for he had been there once. Few escaped Menzoberranzan undamaged or unphased, and Kasia was no different to him. Who knew what demons had disturbed her in the darkness and shaken her soul? Some became sick for home, some felt the utter absence in the still, cold air, some realized the full measures of their past cruelties or injustices, but always innocence was lost.

"Courage, Kasia. You are with friends. Do not despair when we may yet win to the world above."

At length she quietened and seated herself against the rough back wall, playing with her hands with an indecisive air.

Grummin and Kharyssa rose from where they had been waiting, the former with a slightly unsettled look on his tough face.

He told all that had transpired from the dungeons to the Eastmyr. They told of the drow they had met.

"Phauran, they were the same as we met at the Tor, and in Poisson, and in the Lurkwood," he said earnestly. "They've been doggin' our path since we set out in the first place. Even in their own house. What more do they think we have? They already have that darned crystal ball!"

"They obviously think that we're looking for the same thing," Kharyssa said, arms folded thoughtfully. "That crystal ball is a means to an end, or why would we have lived for so long? They would not have tortured us for that amount of time, and so rigorously, even for pleasure."

"They might've done me," Phauran said. No one commented on this, for it was by common opinion true. Elves were the principal enemy of the Drow.

Neither Phauran nor Kharyssa questioned Kasia on her part while she and Grummin had been separated; she was clearly not ready. They told their tale, and Grummin shuddered most grievously when he was told of the leap from the stalactite window.

A plan of escape was now needed. After some well-earned rest, at the dawn of the next day as near as they could guess, they rose with no food. That would be Grummin's job, they decided as they discussed their options. He would venture into the common room in his disguise of ashes and order as much food as their money could buy, for they had pooled the remaining coin from Grummin and Kasias' packs to find that they had one gold piece and thirty silvers remaining.

Phauran would don his hood and cloak and roam, hunchbacked, through the slums, and Kasia and Kharyssa would set out as they were, all looking for the way out. Phauran suggested they spread out northward, as the cavern's darkness held a reassuring solidity that way, according to him. Ixpie would also set out in search, though in the air, and keeping a safe distance, in case such things were watched for in the dark city.

So they departed the inn in higher spirits than before.

"The best we could do was to narrow their location down to the Braeryn, or possibly the Eastmyr," reported Solun helplessly. "They were said to have been seen last flying over that area, or at least the elf and the half-elf, and a human was killed on the Eastmyr side, though that might have nothing to do with the escapees."

"Then focus your search in the Braeryn."

"Can you not use the crystal ball to determine their location?" asked Solun, genuinely curious.

"I already have," Chlorr'yannah replied carelessly. "It has shown me their images, nothing more. I cannot say for sure, for there are many lowly places in this city, and they are indoors. Go now, gather a group from the militia, and scour the slums. I will be waiting for the prisoners."

Solun bowed respectfully and backed out of the open door of Chlorr-yannah's study. It was large and luxurious, of course, a significant chunk of the side of the stalactite. The window became narrower as it climbed and was curved, as per the building's conical shape, and the floor was something like a wedge, with the door near the point. It was a long walk. But back he walked against his better instincts.

When he had closed the door, he turned, and Roaki stood in the hallway that stretched out to the left. Other dark elves crossed in and out of sight, but it was quiet, hushed in the morning hours.

"Roaki," Solun murmured, and the bugbear leaned closer to hear, "we need to search the Braeryn. I shall gather five men and you another five. You have my authority, such as it is. Go and find them, and take them alive, if you can."

Roaki bowed and walked away down the hallway. Solun liked Roaki. Goblinoid though his species might be, he was smart, as smart as some of the drow he had met, though not half as coherent, but still it was rare. He knew why he fought, and when to fight and when to run. The latter was far more important and subtle, of course. Ideals were nothing if one could not fight for them, even the selfless ones, and those were few in the world of drow and goblins. It would be a shame if Roaki died. He thought that he could even sympathise with how Kishtoni had felt as Lo'ol had died, thrown from the tower of Sionaas, though her reaction had been far more zealous than the occasion had warranted. Lo'ol had not been nearly as intelligent, or useful. No, he decided, he didn't feel for Kishtoni. She, like many others, was the victim of ill fortune, though the religious orthodoxy would have said that it was the manifestation of Lolth's damnation on her weak soul. Kishtoni was very brooding, too withdrawn and cowed for his tastes. Solun was obedient, but not yet pathetic. His case had never warranted much force. He knew when to obey.

He strode away from Chlorr'yannah's room. It was not wise to dwell on such things so close to the study of a priestess.

They ventured that the exit might have been found within the day were it not for certain obstacles. The lanes were erratic and seemingly had no pattern or discernable grid. Therefore one could not make even a remotely straight line from the inn to the north, and also could not forge a path through the rickety shacks without creating an almighty uproar which might either get them caught or killed and eaten. And then there was getting caught. Drow patrolled throughout the streets, plainly or not so plainly. Phauran had cautioned that some might be disguised as he was, and all were adept in stealth and the well-practiced art of killing. As they memorized their paths forward for later retracing and delved further and further into the miles of cold waste, they grew to hate the place. The unchanging surroundings of gloom weighed on their hearts so that they longed to retreat to their little room and be in the company of their companions. However they fought bravely on.

And fighting was sometimes needed. Phauran killed two more goblins who tried to mug him, and Grummin even slew a bedraggled bugbear. He had wondered idly for a moment if this had been the one who had accompanied the drow party who had chased them so many times on the surface, but decided that it was not. This one's fur had had a coppery tone beneath the dirt, and the other one was pure black.

However, after days, they had penetrated far into the north.

Kasia stopped and drew aside, into the shadow (as much as there were shadows in this place) of a nearby structure of long, pale stems. What she saw was that the fairway opened out into a clearing in the sea of poverty. She caught her breath. Where she had only been looking straight ahead of her or down to navigate the warren, she now looked up in awe. Beyond a wall that had closed before her with an open gate directly ahead, the city suddenly ended. Spreading down from an unfathomable height, the wall descended smoothly with only a few stalactites. But three hundred yards or so from the ground, the wall retreated into darkness and created an inverted mantle that stretched out of sight in both directions. The space was lined with row upon row of natural pillars and smaller stalagmites and stalactites. It was as if a beast had swallowed the city whole, and Kasia peered through its teeth. A single fault she could see. Directly in line with the gate, a crack, or a high, pointed tunnel sliced the upper jaw for roughly five hundred yards and came to rest on two lines of truly gigantic pillars. These were hung with such torches as the drow could bear, blue and shadowy but sharp. The flickering quality foreboded doom both to those leaving and entering.

When she returned that day, she reported her findings to the others. Grummin and Phauran had both wandered too far east to see what Kasia had, but Kharyssa agreed that she had seen the same thing obliquely, though she described it with less awe and in far more technical detail. It was certainly not a formation of nature, or else the cavern of the city would not still be a cavern but solid rock, and a crater to the world above. It was a bustling road, she had said, though most of the traffic did not flow into the Braeryn but rather the Eastmyr, the more prestigious place for non-Drow or servants thereof. There was brighter light there than in any other place in the city, for the benefit of humans and others not innately gifted with the trick of seeing in near darkness. That was fortunately much the safest way. With the pack and with the light, though they would soon have to split away from both once outside. The tunnels did not lead onto the surface for thousands of miles in that direction, and not without passing many dangers, as Phauran's seemingly bottomless knowledge told them. However he did not seem forthcoming with any alternative.

They did not press him, as their business was first with the gate. This was a much larger gate than the one between Braeryn and Eastmyr, for it was a city entrance, despite its unsavoury contents. Thus it would be much more attentive, informed, and heavily guarded. They would be looking for insurgents, they would be informed of any who were wanted by the houses or other major establishments, and the guards contained wizards and warriors in their ranks. The gate was also flanked by shacks, which suggested reserves and relief, perhaps underground barracks.

They could not fight, and they would not, for it would attract an unprecedented amount of attention, and that they could not afford at any point or in any amount.

Their best hope was in disguise and guile.

Kharyssa noted that Grummin's druergar disguise wore off after mere minutes. He told her that he had simply burned one of Kasia's arrows in secret and caked the ashes to his face. Kharyssa found a pair of small igneous rocks and a limestone rock. She used the two harder rocks to strike up a blaze to burn another few of Kasia's arrows, crushed them, and then requested that Grummin piss on the resulting powder. Hesitantly he did so. Then to his disgust, Kharyssa took up the mixture and spread it mercilessly across his face and other exposed places of his body. She then ground the limestone until it too was a fine powder and simply threw it on Grummin. He coughed and spluttered and did not look pleased for at least an hour of grumbling, though, they all noted, the grey tinge held and did not drip with sweat.

As per the plan they had drawn up together, several items were still needed: two horses, and a cart. Poor Kasia was sent forth to retrieve the horses in the Eastmyr. Horses could not be found in the Braeryn; they would have all been eaten.

Kharyssa and Phauran succeeded in filching a small cart from a bewildered, seedy vendor in the somewhat more habitable section near the inn and hiding it beneath an improvised shelter similar to those that abounded already.

Kasia returned by a gate much farther down where the cliff met the ground below with two horses, stallions whose names were Joseph and Schrazz. She had bought them for a fair price from a caravan of humans who had lost their riders in the wilds. Their faces had been drawn and haunted, most of all when they had spoken of those untamed caverns.

Getting the horses back to the inn was a delicate business. Kasia invoked the message spell to alert Phauran that she would need support. Two cloaked figures, one with daggers drawn and another with a sword, had flanked her thereafter all the way to the inn deterring any who might have thought of killing the horses. From there they had to work quickly, for they could not hide the horses. They brought out the cart and Kharyssa, sheathing her daggers, slithered underneath it. Grummin tied her tightly to the chassis and, with one reapplication of dust, donned a simple smock and threw his pack and axe into the cart.

Kasia cut away much of her ill-fitting clothing to make it as whorish as possible, and then was roped to the cart. Phauran removed his tattered cloak and hood to reveal himself as a simply clad drow female. She had red eyes, white hair, and a taller frame than Phauran had previously sported, though also more shapely. She leapt forward to cover Grummin's cry of shock and panic. Grummin settled after a few wide-eyed seconds in which Phauran assured him that it really was him. "Peace, Grummin. I am your friend." The voice was changed, strong and even slightly butch, but not Phauran's. He (rather, "she") was now a lesser noble for all appearances, Grummin her slave, and Kasia her prostitute, not a particularly uncommon or persecuted occurrence. Grummin eyed Phauran askance.

"I could handle piss-potion, but this?" he shook his head in apparent distaste. "Let's just get on with it."

They attached the horses to the cart and lead them through the Braeryn with all of their supplies, both packs, and all weapons in the cart. All who saw them shied away instinctively from the group lead by the Drow female, and made no attempt on their horses or the contents of their covered wagon.

Finally they came out into the open area leading up to the gates. Narbondel was reaching its dimmest, the light at the top of the pillar. The cart bumped along on the occasional ridges or drop-offs in the unplanned ground, a conspicuous noise in combination with the staccato clip-clop of Joseph and Schrazz. They soon found themselves at the simple arch flanked by the two armed guards. Each was different. The one on the left wore scale mail of black and bore a sword and a dagger on his hips, along with a hand crossbow and a bandoleer of bolts across his chest. The other had two scimitars and nothing else and mail of chains wrought of similar metal and hanging in artful tatters beneath coverings emblazoned with the symbol of a pickaxe within a humanoid head. This one stepped forward, and Phauran stared him down.

"My slave, my whore, and my various other belongings," she said with a subtle note of impatience in her voice.

The guard looked around at them decisively. Grummin and Kasia cast their eyes down, not daring to meet the drow's. Fortunately this was the effect they wanted.

"You may pass," said the guard, and retreated to his position at the right side of the arch. Phauran cast her eyes for a brief moment to observe the passing boundary. They were on the other side after what seemed like much too long a time, and none of them felt like leaping for joy or whooping.

The sporadic stream of incoming creatures with various lights and torches arched away to their left from the huge opening and into the distant Eastmyr gate. That stream moved slowly, but the outgoing was noticeably quicker, indicating either that the guards cared much less what went out or that those people wanted much more to be on their way.

They made to join that lane of traffic.

Between them and their destination was a considerable gulf of space comprised of bare rock. This was sparsely peopled with those who were stopping to regroup after passing customs or before going in, and even a few stalls selling final rations of food or other supplies. They could not buy from these, however, as they no longer had any money.

They passed this with some hesitations but without fuss.

The light was almost blinding after the darkness of the city. They had not noticed after long exposure, but they had been straining to see in the deep gloom, their pupils dilated almost to their limits, and now the torches and lamps bobbed in rows ahead and behind. It stung badly.

The pillars on either side were sentinels, watching with their cold, blue eyes.

After several long hours of marching, they saw the ceiling emerge out of the blackness above. Before long, the travelers were funnelled into a space no more than twenty feet across, past those coming in.

Through this, it was a cavern of considerable size, maybe thirty feet high at its highest point, and much wider. It held a small lake in the middle, around which people were clustered, though they did not drink of the unknown waters very often.

Passages could be seen opening onto the cavern from all directions, ten in all, not counting the one through which they had entered, and every now and then a party or even the rare lone traveler would enter through one and either stop at the lakeside or continue through the road to the city.

"Which one do we take?" Grummin asked in a hushed voice. There was a very quiet, impatient snort from beneath the cart. She was safe, for the cavern rang with the dull roar of voices.

"We have no real choice but to go farther North," Phauran said with no enthusiasm. "We must turn south eventually, but now we should simply put some miles between us and this city."

They started again, though this time Kasia was untied.

The tunnel directly opposite the one to the city was much less inhabited, so Kasia donned her quiver, Grummin retrieved his axe, and Phauran refastened her longsword. Soon they came to a cavern that was completely deserted. It was much smaller, barely twenty feet across and fifteen high. This was where, to their good fortune, they felt it was safe to let Kharyssa go free.

Off to their right, the air wavered. A low rumble sounded and then a crack opened in space, wider and wider, into a yet more viscous, shifting darkness.

The three monstrosities that leapt forth were in the likeness of crocodiles, huge crocodiles, with cruel quartets of claws on each foot, and spiked ridges that might array into wings.

Phauran turned back into a male elf in an instant and drew his sword, and Kasia fumbled to bend her bow and string it.

They positioned themselves so as to flank them almost instantly and prowled inward.

Two immediately pounced on Grummin. He growled at their onset and sprang backward. The first nipped his retreating foot and he yelled in pain, but the second caught him far more firmly on the leg.

Stoically, he kicked the first in the snout and focused on the second one. He gripped the handle of his axe low, raised it above his head, and brought it down ferociously on the demon's head. It released him as cleanly as could be expected.

Kharyssa came to swipe the same one with her daggers, but only one blow sank beneath the scales, and it was wrenched away as the creature moved.

The last drake turned to Kasia. She stepped back as the teeth gnashed before her, and then ducked and twisted when the claws swept back and forth trying to snatch or slice her.

Phauran received three parallel wounds from the claw of the second one attacking Grummin, and blood dripped from his side and arm as he staggered. He drew upon his remaining magic and a fire kindled in his hands. This flame sprayed forth and washed upon the two demons before him. The creatures wailed and shrieked, for their scales withered and smoked at the touch of the fire. Slime burst into vapour and a truly revolting smell filled the cavern.

Through all of this Kharyssa noticed, as the wing-like spines snapped open and closed on their backs, that there was a fleshy opening along these. She drew her remaining dagger, jumped upon the monster closest, and drove it through this pink line at the opportune moment. The roar was deafening as green oozed from the wound. She drew the dagger along and it cut with sickening smoothness. The creature howled as the dagger traveled down its back and thrashed violently, but Kharyssa hung on. Finally it stopped, and was dead.

The first monster reared up before Grummin, ready to use its claws, but the dwarf set his feet and, with an enormous effort, drove his axe deep into what served as the neck. He saw Phauran some ten feet away scampering atop the last one and thrusting his longsword to the hilt into the same opening as Kharyssa had used, and that demon too was dead.

The vision flew from her mind at her will, and she threw a bundle of scrolls from her desk and onto the luminous floor. She had been the one to spot the escaping surface-dwellers; a hand hanging from beneath that wagon. She was surrounded by imbeciles, male vagabonds. And now her portal drakes were dead. What was more, she had seen the imp again. It had seen her with those eyes that she should not fear. She dared not delve back into the demonic plane until she was sure it was safe, though she would have to think up another story for those who could not read her mind. In the meantime, she decided, she would have one of the male commoners, and then whip him. Yes, that would calm her. She would let the matter rest until she could address it.

They had tended their wounds, donned their packs, disconnected the cart and uncollared the horses. These they mounted and rode a bit farther North. The Underdark lay all about them and enclosed their minds, but they were together, free, and breathing. It was an almost incomprehensible thing: they had escaped the stronghold of darkness, the place of which all spoke with fear, and were now heading away. They were by no means clear of danger, but Grummin, Kasia, Kharyssa, and Phauran followed the path into the eternal night with lighter hearts and higher heads.


	7. Deception on the Darklake

**Deception on the Darklake**

The dark days and nights passed unaccounted and nigh unheeded in the deepest paths of the world. Unhewn rock passed underfoot in a dreamlike haze, as though to look down upon the course was to see an ocean dark and teeming. No one wanted to stop, for they all felt that their dark passage was marked by unseen eyes, whether by the earth itself or the multitude of predators that were ever rumoured to lurk the lightless caves beneath the lowest mantle.

The smell was of the slow rot of such minute life as was common in the wilderness. It was a damp, sibilant smell, amplified sometimes by the decaying carcass of a skeleton long since pillaged by its predator, then vermin, then by the unseen passage of time that cleaned away the telltale shreds.

All was quiet and none wanted to break it. They softened their footfalls, checked their breaths and spoke not. The rustle of their poor clothes was the only sound that told of their presence.

At length the party rested. They unfurled their bedrolls and furs and tied the horses, Joseph and Schrazz by name, to an ancient pillar that stretched from wall to ceiling in a nearby niche. A full fire was not risked, for they valued stealth as much at rest as in traveling, but a small torch was carried. For a mile at least they had kept to the low rock wall, feeling along the furrows and crags that served as their guide. Above, behind, and to their right spanned a gulf of darkness that stretched into unknown, unguessed space. It was altogether unnerving and they did not sleep in those hours of the endless night.

A creature of crude instinct watched the weary scene in ponderous malice. Its many legs rippled and shuffled its undulating segments across the uneven ground without sound as it considered the creatures who had stumbled across its lair. It darted backwards momentarily as a wary head turned, trying to mark a soft click or a rustle of soft stones.

They were not drow.

The dreaded words came that night as they stretched their weary limbs and laid out their bedding.

"We will have to double back," Phauran intoned heavily. "We have traveled far enough on our northern course. Any further and we put ourselves in danger of Gracklstugh or Gauntlgrym."

Grummin folded his arms, Kasia shifted uneasily, and Kharyssa's usual demeanour of gloomy acceptance became subtly surlier.

Gracklstugh and Gauntlgrym were cities of the grey dwarves, those who had mounted the assault on Menzoberranzan. Their cities were as dangerous as those of the drow, if not more so, due to their current posture of defence and security.

"You have not yet told us how we shall pass Menzoberranzan without going through it or being detected," Kasia protested, seemingly to the approval of Grummin, for he leaned forward and looked expectantly at Phauran

Kharyssa stiffened. She no longer wondered what course they would take, for there was only one that they could.

And for the first time since the far-away, ill-formed memories of childhood, she was afraid.

"The Darklake," she said slowly.

The others turned to her. She had never expressed any knowledge, geographical or otherwise, of the Underdark. She was not surprised to see the expressions of puzzlement, even alarm, on their faces. Phauran had been their chief authority both in the city and on the road—a mysterious phenomenon in itself, though they had always assumed that his book simply contained an inexhaustible supply of useful knowledge—but Kharyssa had been largely silent throughout their brief sojourn in the Underdark. She understood their alarm, and strangely found herself insulted. They all knew her to be prickly, dour, but this revelation must be simply sinister.

"There were just as many tales of the Underdark in my homeland as in any of yours," Kharyssa admonished icily after a pregnant pause. "The Darklake, being the largest known subterranean body of water, featured in many of them. Spanning many caves, they say, godforsaken, but for one; Lolth, in shape of either a spider or a beautiful drow woman. Those who die there are drawn into the bottomless waters and are left to her cruel care and lurk the unholy places for eternity, for no good god will retrieve the souls of those lost there."

She caught herself. The fanciful tale had passed her lips before she could steel herself against the onset of memory. But she couldn't help see the sand and waters, and the trees of long ago. The trees, the sweet smells that at whiles one could almost taste. And the lonely campfires that yielded such tales.

"An exaggeration, I suspect," said Phauran cautiously, eyes still on Kharyssa but pressing no more. He wanted to press on, and she didn't blame him. He was capable of pressing ahead, Phauran was, and did not lollygag, demanding answers and waiting, as if entitled to her full emotional honesty. Silence and practical discussion was the most she could muster with them, especially since Kasia had joined them, on the foolish whim of Grummin's fancy, but she could fondly remember times with Phauran, in their long-forsaken hut, spent in true silence, a mutual wish to reflect, and understand. "It is true, however, that that is our road," he continued, now looking around at the others. "It spans the flooded caverns directly beneath Menzoberranzan. And I believe I am right in thinking that there is a substantial ferrying service which we may inlist, run by the Kuo-toa, who are impartial to either drow or surface-dwellers."

"Why should kuo-toa need boats," piped up Grummin from beside the horses, though this was through no particular wish of his own. "I know their kind. They can breathe under water. I'm not sure I would put me faith or me feet in their boats."

"They know the lake," Phauran snapped. "They swim in it at times, and know its paths. It is our best hope of leaving these godforsaken caves."

Grummin's gruff demeanour wilted, but he stuck out his thick eyebrows defiantly and sank into a sullen silence.

Kasia was about to open her mouth when a soft click from out of the darkness awoke them to their present situation, and the elevated volume of their annoyed voices.

Phauran's eyes remained trained on its source as he said, "repack quickly, we must leave."

It did not occur to them even to hesitate. They rolled up their rudimentary bedrolls, stowed them in their packs, and slung them on the sides of the horses before mounting.

Phauran held up his hand for silence. A low, steady stream of clicking was building not so far off and coming nearer.

"Run!" Phauran ordered. "Fly! Follow me!"

The order did not come a moment to soon. As they urged their steeds painstakingly to a gallop, a huge shape swilled the darkness behind them. It missed them by a matter of yards and crashed headlong, if it had any, into the cavern wall to their left. Whirling around, Kasia could only catch a vague impression of a smooth, glittering segmented exoskeleton and a river of writhing legs in the small sphere of light cast by Grummin's torch. The thing twisted and whipped its body about, displacing great chunks of wall and ceiling in its effort to reorient itself for the chase. For a moment it was lost to their sight, and they seemed to be leaving its thrashings behind, but then, as the sound died, a much faster whine of clicks began, and again the light glanced upon the bulbous shell. Though again they seemed to be leaving it behind, a new distress struck.

Schrazz, the horse of Kharyssa and Grummin, stumbled. Kharyssa looked down to see a definite limp in the horse's front left leg, slowing his pace.

Phauran, now ahead with Kasia on Joseph, checked his pace to draw back to the others.

The threat of the monster was on them again. Its winding body was plainer now, though not entirely clear: now scuttling on the floor, now mounting the wall, now winding all the way around the tunnel.

This gave Phauran an idea.

Schrazz was flagging with his malady and the combined weight of Grummin and Kharyssa and their packs, and the beast was closing.

A projectile of light, blinding in the dark tunnel, leapt from Phauran's palm and smote the stone to the left of the advancing animal and it did another one of its loops, but something was wrong this time. Cracks had formed even as its trampling legs touched the surfaces of the wall. Titanic parts of the wall slid smoothly out of their places and tumbled down to the floor, and a group of pieces, farther to the right, finally bore it to the ground, and the collapse ceased.

"Woa!" Phauran yelled, and reined Joseph in to a trot. They could hear still a sporadic flailing in the gloom, but it was weak.

They saw Grummin dismount and draw his axe.

"Stay, Grummin," Phauran advised, "I fear this beast is beyond you."

"Not in this state," Grummin trilled. They knew how he felt. The pressing darkness and silence made one wish for something exciting to happen, or some threat to reveal itself instead of lurking in the shadows, either because the heart attack would kill them or because they would be given an innocent excuse to make some noise.

They followed him and his torchlight. Soon a mountain of rubble was revealed. At its foot it was shifting, and at length with a great heaving motion, a portion of the rockslide was shifted aside. It seemed to be the head, but there were no discernable features and it seemed to continue on into the rocks without tapering. The segments joined finely and descended to form a rounded façade over what appeared to be long rows of short, rippling legs.

Grummin took one look, handed off his torch to Kasia, raised his axe, and hew the head with a ferocious blow.

It glanced left and struck the stone with a spout of sparks. He gritted his teeth, wound up, and struck a second time. A crack appeared in the shell, and a sudden hiss came from the tip of the creature.

Two mandibles split to reveal a pinkish flesh, clearly a mouth.

Grummin took advantage of the thing's agitation, swung his axe backward, and aimed a great underhand strike at the opening.

The shell shattered for several segments, which apparently upset the soft flesh beneath, which bled their pale contents until the exposed part of the insect was no more than an empty ragged mass.

"A centipede," Phauran commented dispassionately. "Not uncommon."

Schrazz's hoof was split badly from the run, but it was not catastrophic. Kharyssa stepped forward to fashion the splint from the scanty supplies of their packs, for no common item in the Underdark could help with, or was meant for, healing.

"Schrazz will not be running any more races on this leg for months," Kharyssa voiced irritably. "Let us hope that danger does not find us again before we reach the lake. We'll find enough there as it is."

The horse's strides were now staggered, and Kharyssa and Grummin sought to ride him as little as possible. He bore baggage such as they had, and yet still struggled with this more than he would have. It was clear to look at the two stallions that they had come from poverty into poverty. Their ribs cast rippling shadows on their flanks, and their heads bobbed as they walked. They clearly lacked the energy to keep them erect and alert.

They all pitied the horses, but what could they do that they were not already doing for themselves? Their load was shared fairly and they fed the beasts such as they could without starving themselves.

The hunger and cold made the monotonous miles even more laborious. Their backs were bent, and their eyes downcast as they felt the wall to their left and led Schrazz and Joseph stumbling over the undulating slabs of stone that made up the floor. Finally, however, in another day of travel, though they knew not the time, they came upon a variation in the Underdark's repetitive deathtrap.

A dark shape loomed before them, directly in their path. It was lying in the mouth of a monolithic archway that stretched up into the gloom beyond their sight.

Fully fifteen feet in length as they guessed it, it was completely black, and about five feet high with odd, indistinct bulges.

They moved closer, drawing the horses slowly behind them and squinting.

As they approached they began to get a sense of the texture. Hard, flakey, and shriveled was the exterior, and as they peered farther up, they saw a ridge that presumably bisected the high back. Fanned out in the air or laying on the ground were long spiny constructs that looked bare and lifeless, and as they followed the mass to the left it tapered and ended in the sharp tip of a tail.

They left the horses and crept quietly to the other direction. Finally they came to what was shaped like a head. Two thick horns curled from the sides of the skull forming an evil profile around the thin, cunning face. It was definitely lizard-like. But like nothing they had ever seen. The eyes didn't seem to exist.

Kasia motioned to them from their left, beckoning. They approached.

"Look," she said, and pointed to the creature's side. It had been laid open by a jagged weapon. A five-foot-long tear had rent what they now knew to be a thick armor of scales.

Kasia moved to touch it, but then drew her hand back, bleeding from the tip of a finger.

"Don't touch it," advised Grummin redundantly in a breathless whisper.

"It's dead," Phauran said in a slightly less restrained voice. "But we had better move on."

They all wondered at the body of whatever lizard this might be. It was like the drake thralls, except that the head was thinner and lither, the limbs longer, and those long spines…

They moved around the body and passed quietly through the arch.

They little knew that they had just passed into a realm of much dispute between two factions; the black dragons of the demonic lord Charboondral and the benevolent gold dragons of the court of Eurabatres. It was a feud that was as old as time, or so it was said among the common folk. This dragon was black, counted a mere child of its colossal kin. This particular clash had gone on for a number of years, marked by small incidents and skirmishes in the vicinity of the borders of drow territory.

Now the travelers were in a different realm altogether, and no divine forces governed here, for good or ill.

The echoes of their footsteps and the clip-clop of the hooves of Joseph and Schrazz seemed to be arriving subtly later and later as they started forward, but beyond their sphere of light they now saw no stone or earth. From what Phauran, Kharyssa and Grummin had gleaned with their adept eyes, the walls had swept immediately away, sudden and sheer, on the other side of the archway, and so Phauran had deemed it an inefficient practice to follow the wall. He could not tell for sure, with their inconvenient shortage of illumination, but they all got the ominous feeling that the cavern they were currently traversing was at least the size of a cathedral.

They sped up steadily, wishing for nothing more than for this chamber to end.

Jeroll was not talkative. He had tended the shoreline for nigh on a week without rest. It was not a great area. This craggy beach was accessible only from a doorway in the side of the huge grotto, and farther than that the ceiling met the shore in a mess of overhanging stalactites and pillars. The door had been widened roughly over the course of years in an effort to increase the flow of customers to the barges.

Not that there was much thought given to efficiency nowadays in any case. The volume of customers had decreased by almost fifty percent, even lately, and to make matters worse they knew nothing they could do about it. It was totally inexplicable to the Kuo-toa. They had perhaps heard rumbling and an unusual amount of commotion, or else felt the vibrations in the water, their home. But for time out of mind they had worked their barges to carry those who wished across the long, winding way and so they would keep doing unless stopped by some cataclysmic intervention or invasion.

This was not to say that Kuo-toa were a stagnant folk. They had many dealings with the surface people and those of the water, and some of their kind were even inclined to be nomadic. Pragmatism had simply never led this particular population farther than their tidy business by the Darklake.

Their clientele was ever diverse, of both race and temperament. There were Orcs, Goblins and Bugbears fierce and tough, craven Kobolds shepherding small caravans of common Roth, humans and the like scared and bearing their merchants' goods, grey dwarves silent and threatening.

It was a comprehensive and eclectic view of the Underdark, a glimpse into every society of enough wit to handle currency and seek the other side of the darklake.

But today was not the same. It was almost time for Jeroll to go home and bring the fruits of his long wait. The ones he sought were drawing closer by the day, and he would greet them.

The trek was long and weary, even for the drow. The trail was very faint, but the path was predictable enough. That together with the subtle rumour of their passing in the caverns made their way straight and true. Insofar as any way was straight in the Underdark.

"Perhaps we should send more of your Thralls," Crosaad said unwisely.

Chlorr'yannah whirled around and grabbed a fistful of his robes. A snarl was on her lips and a pale light in her eyes. Crosaad found himself slammed against a jagged rock wall in the simple corridor between caverns.

The snake-headed whip was within an inch of his face in a moment. He could even feel the breath as the little heads hissed

But Chlorr'yannah said nothing. Her chest heaved and her eyes were narrowed, but she didn't seem to find words. Finally, with what seemed to be a considerable effort, she breathed, "shut…up."

He was released, his feet touching the ground and his hands raking his face for any hint of a puncture. His skin was smooth and unblemished. The others cast their eyes down as Chlorr'yannah paced away from Crosaad, clearly intending to lead the way. They followed obediently in her wake as she swept down the rocky concourse and led them on the path.

Days passed and they slunk, blurred in the dark, from hiding to hiding, raking the ground for the telltales of the surface dwellers' passage. Chlorr'yannah drew out the crystal globe periodically and gazed upon the moving images of the light-skinned folk making their clumsy way out of their malevolent province. It was amazing that they had avoided them so long, so uncoordinated were they in the ways of silence and watchfulness. They were gaining on them, that much was evident, but it was still tiresome work.

A sound, a subtle shift of the air, drew them to a halt just before a crossroads, and they listened warily.

The subtle rush grew in their ears swiftly, but nothing prepared them for the concussion of solid on solid that nearly knocked them off their feet and set their teeth buzzing together. Then the light blazed and blinded after the cool shadow to which the eyes were used. Weapons were drawn, spells were ready, feet were set.

It was a high-ceilinged corridor of black-silver rock, and looked as if its riches had already been harvested by the Svirfnebli or the grey dwarves, though that would mean that they would have strayed insolently close to Menzoberranzan.

Kishtoni let fly with her bow, but her arrow ricocheted into the opaque space defined by no more than a purple blur and a vague suggestion of violent thrashing.

It seemed that Chlorr'yannah had better control of her sight, for she leapt forward with her mace held high for a strike. Her blow missed as well, however, and furthermore, the beasts were now aware of their presence.

The scene cleared. Four of the shapes were darker than the other three, and these qualities seemed to distinguish the sides of the battle. On looking closer, they realized that what they saw were dragons. Their wings were folded elegantly above their rippling backs. Their heads dodged and dived, weaving to dodge teeth and claws in the fierce melee.

One black assailant seemed to straggle out of the fight for a moment, and Solun and Roaki charged forth, unleashing a flurry of fierce blows. All was for naught, however, for a moment later the powerful tail of their quarry rose and swept them into a jagged wall to their left.

One of the other dragons turned to them and roared in exasperation. It visibly drew in a breath.

Crosaad saw the mouth open and even noted a glow as the deep fire was kindled in the depths of the fiery belly, and his eyes widened with fear. He raised a hasty hand and stammered the recalled words, and a burst of glittering white shot from his palm.

Not a moment too soon did he perform this spell, for as the frost assailed the air, the fire gushed forth and swept the tunnel. No heat so great or so swift had they ever experienced, not even at the hands of the accomplished Sionaas and his deadly fireball, and that itself had been terrible. Two black dragons he saw were caught in the inferno, along with Kishtoni, Roaki and himself.

The fire ceased mercifully in a second, and they removed their faces from their cloaks and blistered hands.

This fight was not for them.

Chlorr'yannah was caught in the thick of the flying limbs, and was dodging frantically, wild-eyed and tattered. She backed away slowly but was blocked by a swinging tail. She dove above the mighty sweep and recovered shakily to her feet. She joined Solun, Crosaad and Roaki in the dash.

Crosaad stopped in his tracks, and the others, soon noticing his halt, checked their paces briefly.

Crosaad looked back, and the others, knowing his mind in an instant, turned once more, Solun lingering briefly with a look of mingled disappointment and pity.

He watched their receding backs for half a second longer, then returned to the matter at hand. Kishtoni lay on her face, hands splayed and legs crooked. Burns visibly riddled her left arm and he could see and smell singed hair. It was clear that she was unconscious if not dead. Could she yet live? Could she still serve a purpose?

Was she worth the risk?

He drew his whip and sprinted back toward the fray. It was clear to him that the gold dragons were winning, as two of their foes had died and they had sustained no losses to their numbers. They all bore wounds of varying sizes and degrees of severity.

_Crosaad, what are you doing? _Sissu was calling frantically through their empathic bond and wriggling in the inside pocket that was her traveling home.

_Trust me, Sissu. _

A spell sprang to his lips as he ran. His way was barred by a dueling pair and a lone gold creature, but he did not stop. He was buffeted by the forces of the hail of passing blows acting on the cold air, but his goal was almost within reach.

A shock of hard, gold scales stopped him in his tracks and flung his legs out before him. His nose was crushed to one side and the air was driven from his lungs as he hit the ground with a dry thud. He knew that another strike was coming that would finish him, but he was quick to think of his next spell.

The dragon went instantly blind and flailed, missing the supine wizard by a long shot.

He wasted no time in getting back to his feet and stumbling the remaining few feet to Kishtoni's prone body.

He touched her and instantly released the spell that he had prepared. They were invisible, and he was preparing to hoist her onto his back when he sensed a deeper darkness looming.

He looked up in fear and saw a monumental body falling to the floor to burry them and send them to the care of their goddess.

Grummin set his feet apart and stood before Phauran, resolute in disapproval.

"I don't like these folk at all," he informed the elf sternly. "Have we ever been better off after tanglin' with anyone in these stinkin', dank caves?"

"The Kuo-toa are not like the drow," Phauran replied patiently. "They do not seek for blood or pain, nor do they hate any race needlessly."

"C'mon," he pressed, "they live in the bleedin' lake, in the Underdark! They've got to have somethin' bad about 'em."

Kasia moved forward, gripping her unstrung bow in her hands with a strained look on her face. Then again, maybe they all looked like that.

"I think Phauran's right," she said tentatively. "He's been reliable so far, and not all peoples in the Underdark need be considered evil."

"Who asked you, girl?" Grummin's voice lashed out and bit Kasia's remark. She cringed visibly and shrunk away. Phauran bent a calculating gaze on Grummin, but the dwarf stood his ground still. "How do ye even know all this about this place, eh? I bet not all o' that knowledge came from yer book."

Phauran's hand struck like lightning, and produced a crack akin thereto, or so it seemed to Kharyssa and Kasia, as it batted the flesh of Grummin's face and threw his head aside. He stumbled back, but his hands were balled into fists.

Kharyssa stepped forward then and laid a steadying hand on Grummin's shoulder. His great barrel chest heaved great, shuddering breaths, and his face was red, both from anger, it seemed, and the weal that Phauran's hand had left.

"You will follow me." His voice was low but heavy, his eyes steady and his hands grasping his belt in an apparent attempt to resume a modicum of calm. "You must follow me or you will die in this subterranean waste." He relaxed, but still looked coldly at Grummin. "We're wasting time."

Solun had never really known Crosaad, but now he missed the sorcerer, for the chain of command was now direct in the wilderness. Nothing had really changed, but it had been comforting to know that there was something stopping Chlorr'yannah from beating or using him upon a whim. Also, he had considered him a very adept spell-caster.

"It will be more difficult to overcome the surface-dwellers without Crosaad and the Shamed," Solun put in as they trotted down a sloping concourse. They had had to find a way around the area where they knew the dragons had fought and Crosaad's body lay, and even then they had treaded with extreme caution. None of the three could fathom what a group of gold dragons was doing in this region, however. This was most definitely not their domain as they understood it. They were benevolent creatures and dwelled in higher places. That they sought conflict with the black dragons of the Underdark this close to their city boundaries was somewhat disturbing.

"Do not speak out of turn," came the predictable response, then, "We are more than their match, fool. It was a simple task to capture them in the woods and it will be as simple now."

The miles passed now uneventfully. Chlorr'yannah referred many times to the crystal ball that she kept always on her person, but it could only give an image, so she had to rely on her admirable knowledge of the passages criss-crossing the innards of the earth in order to navigate. Often they found unmistakable signs of encampment, such as a faint layer of soot from a small fire, a lone berry on the ground, and even a strip of fabric stuffed hastily into a nook. Perhaps they didn't think that they were being followed this closely, or at all.

Their march brought them through a series of long, huge caverns, connected by large archways, some even cultivated with carven runes, and then the size of the tunnels diminished again to a near claustrophobia.

Now the ways became wetter and fewer, descending in some places completely into the water and forcing them to make arduous detours. Roaki trouped along, nursing the recent wounds but stoic and unfazed as ever.

There was one detour, however, that Solun could not explain.

There was a corridor, long and plain. It was straight, which was unusual, but not unheard of. Perhaps a centipede had bored it. But there was something else. There was a darkness there that blurred even the vision of the drow. Things flitted in that fog, either small or very distant. Eyes of white and red appeared and fled into the distance.

Chlorr'yannah turned immediately aside and led them far wide of that place.

Only a few hours more brought them to a widening, marked by the etchings of tools that made it so. They could see faint lights at the end of the tunnel. There was a bustle of movement and a low murmur of voices. They could even hear faint splashes as the water was upset, for water there was. They had come to the darklake, and here was the shore where all who dared boarded their barges and boats and crossed. It was still distant, almost half a mile of tunnel.

Chlorr'yannah drew out the crystal ball for the umpteenth time. Her weary hands clasped it and she saw them clearly, the elf, the human, the half-elf and the dwarf, and beside them, a small creature with a long hooked pole shoving off the side of the rock and setting the barge floating out into the lake.

Chlorr'yannah surfaced, looking up in frustration, rose to her feet and ran. The others sped up behind her and the sounds of Solun's longsword and Roaki's great falchion coming out rang behind her, as if they thought that the race was up and a fight was at hand. But alas as they came to the opening into the great cave the barge was beyond reach and they were stayed.

As they drew within sight of the throng—and this they considered relative, comparing it only to the desertedness of the whole of their path thus far—they spotted a race they had never seen before. Small and sallow-skinned, their eyes were bulbous and unblinking and searched never-ceasingly throughout the crowd. Their hands and feet were webbed, and they had two of each, and they bore no weapons or packages. They seemed to be in charge, milling about the groups of various kinds and shepherding them closer together. Every now and then one of these groups would be herded onto a flat, shallow barge with sparsely-distributed oars, all manned by the creatures. These were the Kuo-toa, and this was their trade here.

The flapping sound of broad, webbed feet approached from the dark to their left and the group backtracked perceptibly. The huge, pale eyes emerged first into the dull light and then the moist skin and drawn features made for the water made themselves eerily apparent. A tablet of unknown material surmounted by a patch of parchment was clutched in the long-fingered hand, inscribed with a flowing script whose words they could not decipher.

"Do you speak the common tongue?" inquired the creature in a sibilant, though not hostile, voice. His companion joined him, a taller, slightly slimmer creature, whose skin had a more turquoise hue in the scant light.

"We do," Phauran replied, "and we wish to hire passage across the lake."

"Very well," said the Kuo-toa. "For four orc-sized beings the fee is four gold pieces, non-negotiable, but for the beasts it is another four, again non-negotiable. Are you sure you would like them to accompany you?"

Phauran did not pause for his answer. "Yes. How soon can we be away?"

"If you pay immediately and space doesn't run out in the line there," he pointed to a milling line with about three abreast boarding the barge closest, "then your barge shoves off in a few minutes. If not, then you will have to wait until the next barge is full. That should not be a problem, but some of these ruffians can be unruly so if speed is an issue you should be going." He blinked at them. "And extinguish your light. The other customers will not be happy, and we are not just saying that for our sake."

Phauran extricated the gold pieces from his bag and laid them regretfully in the keeping of their host before striding off into the closest line and snuffing the flame of their now diminished torch on an outcropping of stone. They greatly lamented their independent source of light, for it was their beacon in the long dark and their comfort at night in this hostile land. It was ill to part with on the darkest and least certain part of their journey.

The group now pressed as the column narrowed and filed onto the barge.

"Hey," came a deep, gravely voice from behind them, and a jostling and a chorus of dismayed voices in various tongues accompanied that sound. "We paid before you. Get outa the way!"

A pair of muscular bugbears bustled past them and shoved them aside. Kharyssa placed a placating hand on Grummin's arm in order to restrain him from confronting the bugbears.

They were pushed back in line, and to their dismay, the barges filled rather more quickly than they had been lead to suspect. The first of the vessels was packed within a minute, and the group moved on to the next one. It was the third barge before finally they were able to climb aboard, though their horses had to be lead on to the fourth. Three Kobolds had managed to slip onto this barge with them, along with the same Kuo-toa as had first spoken to them and accepted their money. The creature smiled, an odd, shark-toothed smile, and signaled those of his kind operating the oars to begin.

Their barge fell silently in line in the convoy of four, and they traveled across the wide grotto. It narrowed into a canal flanked with stalagmites and stalactites, all rippling past in the odd, orange light that was carried in a lantern hanging from the blunt bow. The ripples cast shadows like flames all around them. It was not entirely dark, but now it was somehow harder to see.

Nevertheless their eyes adjusted, and they were able to see distinct shapes in the disindividuating light. The barge farthest ahead was occupied by the most hulking dozen of creatures they had ever seen. The vessel was sagging low with the weight of twelve Ogres, gangly-armed, stubby legs, bodies shaped like boiled beans and heads thatched with weedy hair. The second was occupied by a few orcs and bugbears, and a handful of grey dwarves, and the one behind them, holding Schrazz and Joseph, also bore seven unfamiliar, grotesque beings. They had the stature of men, but were thin. They all wore variations on the same black robe, but the worst was their heads. Their skin was starkly white, if not pale green, and where mouths should have been, a tangle of tentacle-like appendages waved, as if feeling the air around them. Other than their eyes, this was the only feature of their heads, for they were hairless and had no ears or discernible noses. There was something more about them, though. Schrazz and Joseph were visibly quivering, stomping the deck of the barge and swaying their heads nervously up and down.

"What are they?" inquired Kasia of the Kuo-toa at the head of the barge in disgust. He turned and looked upon the malevolent creatures dispassionately with his huge eyes.

"They are Illithids," he replied, and turned himself to face her fully. He sat upon the deck and gestured for them to do likewise, which they did except for Grummin who was uneasy. "More commonly referred to as mind-flayers. They are as bad as their name. Their weapon is to invade and rape the minds of their victims and enslave them to their city where it is said they keep a sort of hive mind. They also have a taste for living brain matter."

Grummin and Kasia concealed looks of horror at the description, and Grummin's hand even crept up to feel his skull before snapping back down to his axe haft.

"How came you to be on this barge?" Phauran asked politely, seemingly unfazed by the mind-flayers.

"I do not know what you mean," said the Kuo-toa, still facing them.

"It seems that you could have had your pick of the barges, yet you chose the one that is one but last in line."

The Kuo-toa smiled again, that strange, sharp-toothed smile. "Do you see the company I would otherwise have had," he laughed, "and indeed usually do have, for the entire voyage? I wished some civilized conversation for once. And I admit I was a little curious, and still am, as to how you have come here. It is true that we get diverse folk on this trip and everywhere in the Underdark, but very seldom do we see a dark elf in the company of one of the surface-dwelling kindred."

They all tensed, except for Kharyssa, who saw the creature's mistake. "My blood is of the island people, not the dark elves. I am not so dark as they, as can be seen in the light. Also I am a half-elf."

He nodded. "My apologies. Forgive me, I am Glishu, a member of the clan that runs the business of ferrying the stone-walkers. I would say the name of my clan, but it is nigh impossible to articulate above the water, and I have only supplemented my true name given the circumstances."

Phauran leaned forward. "I am Phauran," he said.

The others said their names in turn, and even Ixpie showed her face to make her voice heard.

"Do not your kinds also assign surnames after their fashions?" Glishu inquired in polite confusion.

"We do not know our names," Phauran said regretfully. "Or we have none. It is one of the things that drew us together in the first place."

"I see that your familiar can speak," said Glishu, now scrutinizing Ixpie who was clinging to the front of Phauran's robes. "How old is she?"

"I am six years of age," Ixpie supplied autonomously.

"Then you are some manner of spellcaster?" pressed Glishu.

He tried not to show it, but he was really taken aback by this genuine display of curiosity after weeks of traipsing along with the same lot, and also a bit suspicious. This Glishu was obviously very interested in them, beyond mere curiosity, he thought it. He tried also to factor in his undoubted paranoia as an excuse for this creature's behavior, but nevertheless he was uncomfortable.

He would not scorn an opportunity for conversation after a long expanse of irritable observations and words of caution, however, so he pressed on.

"I am a wizard foremost. I animated Ixpie about a year after I began my studies."

"And re-animated me after about ten years," said Ixpie half exasperated, half-jokingly.

"I admit I did not know that was possible," Glishu said in more of an awed murmur. "I am a spellcaster myself, though of no great talent. A sorcerer, actually." He closed his eyes momentarily, made a slow, circling motion with his palm down, and then released the magic almost imperceptibly. Phauran shifted back, for the deck of the barge had suddenly become transparent, along with the shallow hull. There were very few layers between them and the dark water.

"There, if you can strain your eyes, is my familiar. He does not stray far from me if he can help it and I was loath to work the shore shift for a week prior to this trip."

They could not see for a moment, but then, ghostly and ominous, came the glittering sheen of a scaly back. It was a fish unlike any they had ever seen. Long and thick, its head ended in a wide, blunt mouth, with tendril-like whiskers at its corners. The fish actually bore something of a resemblance to Glishu.

"He only speaks aquan, and cannot leave the water," Glishu continued as he dispelled the transparency.

Kasia was awed as the clear portal closed soundlessly. It was surely unconventional for a fish to be a familiar, but then again, there were probably many waterways snaking up and down the Underdark, and both sorcerer and familiar were accustomed to the water. She wondered if Glishu, too, could respire beneath the surface, or if he could only hold his breath.

She looked up. They had just entered a cavern so colossal that the dim light barely found the ceiling, and the shores were distant indeed. The light danced in red patterns on the illuminated surfaces. She felt very small, even with a barge full of beings to bolster their numbers. They were drifting past the unreachable land in little toy boats.

Sparing a thought for the horses she looked sympathetically back. There they were, shivering and terrified in the midst of the Illithids. They knew that escape was far away. The creatures did not even speak. Not aloud, anyway. They just waved their tentacles, perfectly still otherwise, and waited.

Then she spied something else. A light beyond the last barge in the line, looming up from behind. Had she been on the surface, had she even departed more recently than she had, she would not have noticed the faint dot, but now it was clear, and it was growing. She was worried.

"The light doesn't shine very far," Grummin said uneasily. "I couldn't see the fish until he was right there."

Phauran puzzled. He raised his hand, but then turned to their guide. "May I?"

"Cast a flare? Only if it is dim enough," he stipulated. "I do not wish the others to be in discomfort."

Phauran nodded and cast the small orb of light. It pulsated, but did not penetrate more than ten feet before its rays dissipated. He lowered the ball, curiously. It entered the water, but was almost immediately swallowed in darkness. "It is merely a trick of the Underdark's water," Phauran concluded comfortingly to Grummin.

Up ahead the leading barges entered a tunnel, presumably into another cavern. It seemed that this huge cavern was not the sole constituent of the Darklake. As they entered, the paddles had to be placed in the gunnels and allow the barge to coast. Phauran noticed that the orb was now skimming the bottom, a mess of algae and rot.

"The tunnels narrow at the bottom as well," said Glishu informatively, "such that the depth fluctuates. Out in the larger caverns, the depth can reach as much as two thousand feet. This lake is a marvel."

Kasia turned around and tapped Grummin on the shoulder. He turned around and she pointed pack across the barge towards the light that she had sighted. He was able to make it out, it seemed, for he squinted.

Then they saw it enter the tunnel, and the faint reflections of the dim light showed a substantial shape looming up behind.

"Looks like another boat," Grummin said, puzzled.

Glishu abruptly stopped his conversation with Phauran and Ixpie. He climbed to his feet just as the tunnel ended and they found themselves in a cave no smaller than the one they had just vacated. "That is strange." He manoeuvred his way to the stern, stepping over the sitting Kobolds and onto the transom. "Can you see who it is?" Glishu shouted to his counterpart at the next barge, the tall, lanky one from before. The Kuo-toa only shook his head.

It was then that a blast rocked the monumental cavern and a light sprang into being. Momentarily blinded, those on the third barge in line only saw a shadow of flying bodies.

Ears ringing, Kasia recovered her sight just in time to see the Kuo-toa on the next barge dive from the bow and take to the water.

"Jeroll! Rofani a carloo!"

Phauran turned his head sharply. It was Glishu who had spoken, but not in any language of water. Kasia recognized it too, for the words were draconic. More fluent than even the elf were the words, and no spell was manifested at their speaking.

The trailing vessel now slowed and veered, and Glishu called up the line for a halt, and all the boats back-paddled for one stroke. The waves of their impetus crashed raucously as they drifted and thumped to a halt.

The unknown vessel was now manoeuvring its way around the besieged fourth barge and overtaking it. Now that her vision was recovering, Kasia could see the face-down bodies of the illithids, some even now being subverted by the bow of the oncoming barge.

Then she saw the red eyes beyond the orange lantern of the prow, and Kasia knew what was afoot.

"Forward," she yelled, "Now!" she strung her bow and let fly desperately, but the eyes disappeared and reappeared unharmed, as if in derision.

Chlorr'yannah allowed herself a smug grin as the rowers set once again to their oars. The goblins they had captured rowed fiercely to live up to the silvers they had each been promised and the bow clove the water as they sprang after their fleeing adversaries. They had no weapons to match the drow for long, and now, they would die. No more imprisonment for these troublesome fugitives; they would have to be obliterated completely.

They could see the third in line readying for battle, and knew that must be the surface-dwellers' craft.

It was drawing nearer in their view, and as they gained, Chlorr'yannah waved her hands and chanted gleefully. She could feel her goddess giving her power, and she reached out to the demonic realm to bring forth her creatures of ruin and unleash them upon the travellers from the world of the sun.

But as they drew near, and they could see the defiant fire in the eyes of their victims, Chlorr'yannah, Solun, and Roaki faltered.

Kasia, Phauran, Grummin and Kharyssa felt it as well. A wind, a definite breeze, had crossed them. All halted their work, even the horses, now some way behind, though their barge was still floating forth, stilled and listened.

It increased and began to howl, this unholy wind that was not of the world. They all felt it, and those who had been there were sent uncomfortably back to the Lurkwood, where the Wendigo had conjured a storm for its concealment. This air, however, had a tang of dank weed and fungus that was a different sensation entirely.

Phauran was the first to look up, and then Kharyssa, and they all beheld the horror and panic in their eyes. There was a cloud, malevolent and sickly purple, gathering in a swirl of thundering vapour that was ghastly to behold.

As they returned their eyes to the barge, they saw that all the Kuo-toa were bailing over the sides in elegant dives reminiscent of the one performed by Jeroll, as they had heard him called back at the very mouth of the chamber.

The boat with Schrazz and Joseph bumped up against theirs and they could be seen to whinny and neigh and flail their forelegs, and their eyes were wide with fright.

Kasia could not understand. "Phauran? What is happening?"

The horses leapt the small gap, knocking many Kobolds over the side and into the dark water. Dark.

"Step away from the side!" he yelled, and seized the front of her ill-fitting shirt to bring her closer.

But it was what she next saw that decided her and cleared her confusion.

After the Kobolds had entered the water, the surface had not stopped churning. It was seething. The wind was now oppressive, buffeting them and actually dragging the barges to the starboard side. As she looked further, she saw the dead illithids disappear beneath the surface one after the other. When the last disappeared, she caught a glimpse of a shining, slimy limb.

The Kobolds, those who remained were squawking incoherently and jostling on the other end to get to the center and away from the water that they now dreaded. But this was made much more difficult as a rocking began. The wind that was whistling on every surface was now drawing up great swells and white water flashed in the lightning as eddies formed a great froth and spray. The waves grew and the barges began to shift. The one the horses had just vacated smashed violently into their stern and then drew away as a wave came between them and they slid into separate troughs. They could see through the distorting mist of spray that the goblins of the drow-controlled boat were still working. They were trying to follow their quarries, but this was made difficult by the waves, which were crossing them and causing them to jostle anew.

"What is happening?" Kasia screamed again over the wind and rumour of water hitting the deck.

She saw Glishu come down from the foredeck on steady legs. They had not noticed, but he had stayed when all the other Kuo-toa had run for their lives to their home waters. "No time," he yelled, then, "Remain in the barge as long as possible. Do not go near the edge, and hold fast to the deck."

They were lifted on high by an almighty wave and they saw from the peak the barge that was foremost when they set sail. The Ogres stood together with their weapons drawn in the dark as the rain whipped around them, but they could see that their numbers were dwindling. Sporadically, tentacle-line appendages struck from all different sides and whipped an Ogre from the side of the barge. If they ever had time to scream, they were not heard over the clamour. When a cluster of five held the barge with their thick scimitars, fending off the efficient arms, a rending creak tore the air. Two huge, trunk-sized limbs rose and then descended, cracking the vessel in two like a dry branch. The Ogres howled in despair and poured over the sides in earnest.

They felt a jerk, and the bow dipped. They felt their huge bulk descending from the cap of the swell into the deathly cauldron where lay the wreckage of the ogres' barge.

Seconds before they dove forward, Kasia summoned the magic and recalled the words, a simple spell. A small orb of light coalesced in the palm of her hand and she cast it into the waters before them. Before she was seized once more and pulled back, she saw the tangle of tentacles like a forest of white reeds and the miniscule bodies of those in the water, and all of this seemed to share a center, a great maw of darkness.

They plunged downwards and water spilled over the prow and soaked them further. As they looked around they saw what they feared to be true. The waves all swirled around that center as well. They were descending into the eye of a great whirlpool, and the remains of the boat before them were being chewed up and dragged under. Not quickly enough.

With an almighty thud and a crunch that was painful to the ears, they smote upon the halved wreck and the wood burst into a thousand pieces. They sheltered from the hazardous rain and then drew weapons, knowing that the fight for their lives was at hand.

Chlorr'yannah saw this and was dismayed. Their enemies may die, and yet they might live also. They had shown incredible resilience and resourcefulness in her experience, and she could not take the chance that they might escape.

"Forward!" she cried in the goblin tongue. "Make for them, and draw!" Within mere seconds, they were about, and they raged down the slope of the water.

They saw the drow coming and braced, but they knew that they would not fare well for this turn of events. Alone in the clamour of water and wind came Glishu's voice. "Out of the way!"

Phauran, Kasia and Grummin dove forward, and Glishu jumped for the stern, and the bow of the enemy barge came upon them with tremendous force.

The forward section broke through the ramshackle railing and the flat hull, studded with barnacles and yet slick with algae grated across the deck until it came to a stop, resting atop their vessel that was their safety from the dread water.

The forward oars had been shorn off in the crash, and so the drow and Roaki reckoned that they would find it easy to spring on their foes and kill them.

But as they all squared for battle among themselves, a shudder wrenched them back to the matter of the water.

The waves erupted in a flurry of tentacles which immediately whipped through their ranks. The goblins, straggling at the back of the surmounting barge, were picked off immediately, and then they were besieged from all sides. Kharyssa was immediately tripped up as she attempted a double slash at her assailant, and both she and Phauran were raked by a vicious pair of the slimy horrors. Roaki was struck and dashed against the broken points of the oars, and he wailed in his guttural voice as his side was pierced.

Just as Kasia fired an arrow into one of the arms besetting Phauran, she was ensnared, and fell to the deck, losing her grip slowly on a small cleat.

Chlorr'yannah was waving her mace frantically at the arms that were twisting and writhing, but she was buffeted, and then swept against the side of the barge that was pressing the deck on which they stood gradually downward.

Soon, as they laboured against the tentacles, the water was flooding over the gunnels, cold and insidious, and rising to their ankles.

Chlorr'yannah perceived Solun being enfolded in another of the thick limbs and whipped out of sight. She supposed that he was gone.

Kasia's face was staring upwards. She could see Grummin and Phauran dodging and ducking, and Grummin even noticed her struggles, but he was forced back to his own fight as he entirely cut one of the snaking tentacles to a stump.

After that she felt the water around her ears. She forced her bowstring one-handed over her head as her body was submerged and took the final breath. All around her there was chaos, then the deck pressed to her back tipped to an almost vertical angle and she released the cleat at last.

The water was all around her, heavy and dark. She could not see the others as she flailed for panicked seconds and the tentacle around her leg dragged her ever deeper.

At last, she gathered herself and her senses cooled. She could not see, but she could feel. Her hand felt behind her head, and she realized that her arrows were almost gone, floating through her ragged blonde hair and into the unreachable. She seized the first of two and stabbed downward. Red blood immediately clouded upward from the hole she had made, and the limb twitched. She stabbed repeatedly, but it did not relent.

A light, a dim, pale illumination, but more than enough for her to see, flared up in the water, and she though that it must be her little light, but this wasn't it. Hers had been red, and quite a bit darker than this. It was white and eerie, rays interrupted by the commotion that was still close about her. Through the haze of blood, she could see the floating parts of the barges now apparently huge and hulking, seemingly immobilized in the gloomy water. There were smaller pieces, and amid these were the clothed figures of friend and foe. She could see Kharyssa in a mad tangle with two of the remaining arms, Grummin some ways below her struggling to slow his descent in his heavy half-plate armour; she could see one of the male drow being dragged down.

She would have screamed if she had been in any setting to do so. There was a beak below his feet, colossal and sharp, and that was the hub of eight coordinated growths grabbing and whipping. Below that was a column of flesh that extended into a distant, tapering point. Near to the arms and beak was an eye, which was presumably one of two, the size of a dinner table, rolling and dilating as its precious members were attacked.

The tentacle below her was cut, and she could move her leg, and then Phauran was there, gripping her arm and scowling in concentration. She suddenly realized that she was short of breath, and then imagined what Grummin must feel like and her eyes widened.

But after this realization, something happened that was the most bizarre of all their plights thus far.

Lean shapes marked by glittering gold whizzed from a darkness beyond the Kraken. All about them now were jets of bubbles that seemed to be the wakes of these new creatures.

The Kraken was descending now itself, tentacles undulating and pushing the water, and with a final spurt, it secreted a thick spray of ink and was gone.

The world of sight darkened once more. They saw Kharyssa fading out of sight, a frightened expression on her stern features as she was dragged down helplessly in the monster's wake, and next felt the grip of hard claws and the rush of the speeding lake around them.


End file.
